


Lusus Naturae

by EmSheshan



Category: The Beatles (Band)
Genre: Angst, Crying, Depression, Gen, Ghosts, Hurt/Comfort, Lovecraftian Monster(s), Other Additional Tags to Be Added, Sick Character, Transformation, Vampires, Vomiting, Werewolves
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-10-19
Updated: 2019-11-09
Packaged: 2020-12-24 04:53:55
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 11
Words: 21,579
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/21093713
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/EmSheshan/pseuds/EmSheshan
Summary: When Paul woke up that day, he found that he was a ghost and that he and his friends had supernatural powers beyond their comprehension.But then he finds that the entire world had turned against them, and now strange visions are pushing themselves into his mind.And even with all that, he still has to worry for his mates and George.





	1. Good Morning Good Morning

4:34 AM

The first thing Paul feels when waking up is how cold he is. It's hard to breathe, and the heavy duvet is doing nothing to warm him. Tilting his head over, he sees John and George still sleeping, while Ringo is sitting up.

But there's something wrong because Ringo is clutching his head between his knees.

"Ringo? Are you alright?" Paul tries to ignore how hollow his voice sounds. 

"Me head, it hurts..." He mutters, and his voice is creaky. "I think I might be sick."

_ If you're sick, I am too, _ Paul thought. But, he doesn't feel ill, just off. If Ringo is coming down with something, however, then chances are Paul's got it too. And going off of that, the other two might catch their bug as well.

_ Brian's going to blow his lid if we're all sick… but it’ll be fine. _He was probably just jumping to conclusions. But, just to be safe, he’ll try to take it easy today.

Paul can’t take the cold and rises. Maybe a hot shower and a warm cup of tea would help. As he stands up, he notices the sky outside, more specifically, how dark it is. There are faint traces of orange near the horizon, but it’s dimmer than the stars in the sky. Paul groans. They had just landed in New York around three’o’clock, so that means he only got about one hour of sleep. Strangely enough, Paul doesn’t feel tired at all, just bitterly cold.

Ringo doesn’t move at all, his migraine too severe. He listens to the sound of water streaming out of the bathroom and then Paul cursing.

“Paul?” he tentatively calls.

“It’s freezing!” Paul calls back. The water hits him and saps any heat in his body. _ Who the hell thought cold showers were a good idea? _Paul wants to turn it off, but he’s already wet, so he cranks the heat up and tries to clean himself. Even though the knob is turned as high as it can go, it’s still ice cold. He’s about to complain to Ringo when he sees white vapors rising.

Steam.

Which makes no sense, because the water is cold. There’s no possible way it could be steaming. But Paul looks out of the shower and sees that the mirror has all fogged up. He gets out, wraps a towel around himself, and wipes his hand across the mirror. It definitely steamed up, as his hand clears the condensation. And then he lets out another curse: “No fuckin’ way...”

“Wha’re you on about...” mumbles George. Paul didn’t mean to wake him but--

“I can’t see my reflection!”

The younger man stirs and climbs out of bed. “....cold in here,” he states, as he enters the bathroom. Paul’s wiped off more of the mirror, but his reflection isn’t there, and neither is George’s.

George stares at the bizarre phenomenon for a moment. “That’s weird,” is all he says in response.

“That’s weird? It’s insane!” Paul squawks back. “That’s not how mirrors are supposed to work!”

“It’s probably broken,” George replies and then gestures to it. “I bet it’s a trick mirror. Like the ones they have at carnivals.” Paul wants to argue because he just can’t believe the concept of a mirror reflecting everything except a person, but then he realizes what’s happening.

“Oh, I think there might be a duplicate room.” 

“Huh?”

“Y’know, this mirror is actually just glass and there’s another identical room across from us.” It’s a weak explanation, but it’s enough to satisfy the two, so they shrug and head back into the bedroom. There’s no reason for a hotel to set up a fake mirror, but there’s no other way to explain their lack of reflections. If Ringo cares, he doesn’t show it, still curled on the bed.

“Oh, sorry for waking you, Geo,” Paul quietly apologizes, wary of John’s sleeping form.

“It’s fine, it’s too cold to sleep anyway.”

“I know, right? I’m gonna put on some tea to heat us up.”

“Ta, Paul.”

Paul watches as George sits down next to Ringo, whose behavior is starting to concern him, and begins to get dressed. Meanwhile, George sits with Ringo. “How’re ya feelin’?” he asks the older man.

“Feel like I’m burning up,” he whispers. 

“Are yeh stealin’ me an’ Paul’s heat?” George jokes.

He then places his hand on Ringo’s head and frowns. Ringo looks like he’s got a nasty fever, but his forehead isn’t “burning up” at all. It’s the same temperature as everything else in the room.

“Jus’ try to get some rest, okay Rings? I’ll see if I can ask Brian to take it easy today.”

Ringo just mumbles something incomprehensible back as George and Paul exit the room. To their left, the door to the hallway and a small living room-like area with a television. To their right, a small kitchen. They look for a kettle, but can’t find one, so they opt for the next closest thing, coffee.

The liquid isn’t tea, but they don’t mind. Honestly, it’s so cold, they would drink boiling water at this point. “Cheers,” Paul says, and then they raise their mugs to drink.

And then their faces contort with displeasure. Their drinks are frigid_. _Paul puts his down immediately, refusing to drink cold coffee, but George keeps at it, valuing the caffeine over his internal temperature.

“First the shower, now this… Does anything in this room work right?” Paul rhetorically asks. “Today just isn’t my day,” he laments.

George can’t swallow the last, bitter sips of his drink. “Yeah. I think Ringo’s sick as well.”

_ Shit. _“Eppy’s not gonna like that.”

“Mhmm. He says he’s burning up, but he didn’t feel warm at all.”

Paul nods, and then they sit there in silence. Paul feels miserable right now and he knows George does too. They have nothing to do except wait for morning, praying the sun will heat them. It’s August for crying out loud, not the middle of January.

“Do ya wanna cuddle,” George asks after a minute, “to heat up?” Paul agrees, and they make their way to the couch, sitting so close their thighs are touching. If George could look into a mirror, he’d see the light pink dusting his cheeks. Paul takes the small TV remote and puts something on, just to pass the time. The volume is cranked down, for John and Ringo’s sakes.

Well, Ringo’s sake. John can just do whatever.

Maybe it’s their proximity, maybe it’s the distraction, but for whatever reason, the chilly air of the room doesn’t affect them as much. They make it to their first commercial break when George jumps up and darts into the other room. Concerned, Paul follows and listens to the sound of liquid splashing.

George is hacking as coffee mixed with bile spews from his mouth and falls into the toilet. 

So two of the Beatles are sick. Paul would like to include himself, but he's just cold, not vomiting like George.

He gets down next to George and places his hand on his back, rubbing it in small circles.

"This is bad," Paul mutters. George looks up at him with an expression that screams _ No shit, Paul. _

“You wanna lay down?” he asks, but George just shakes his head no.

“I’m not tired, it was just the coffee. Didn’t agree with me.” Paul doesn’t believe George’s words for a second. He wants to call him out, but George is still panting over the toilet bowl, hand resting on his abdomen. Only saliva is leaking from his mouth, and he stares as it falls into the water with his vomit.

“Let’s just go back and watch the show,” George says as he rises. Paul opens his mouth to object, but decides it’ll be easier to just coax him asleep than to force it. He looks over and sees that Ringo had thrown the covers off of him. He’s just laying there, eyes hazy and unfocused. Either he’s been struck by insomnia, or he’s just sleeping with his eyes open. Silently, he takes the heavy blanket and drags it back to the couch where George is laying.

He might have been a little concerned for Ringo, but he’s a lot more worried about George. After all, the lad’s like his little brother. It’s natural to feel responsible for him. He seats himself next to George and watches as George automatically moves to place his head on his lap. It’s a bit funny, but he knows it’s comforting, so he lets his fingers run through George’s hair as they wait for morning to come.

* * *

8:11 AM

Despite how cozy they got, neither one of them fell back to sleep. George kept complaining of stomach pains, and the pain distracted him too much to fall asleep.

It’s not looking good for him, and Paul doubts Ringo is faring any better. Glancing over he notices it’s past eight, so now is a decent time to talk to their manager. Brian and Mal are in the adjacent room, and he knocks gently, incrementally increasing the intensity over time. 

It takes about a minute for the door to open.

“Paul?” It’s Brian. “What’re you doing up? You should be resting for the show tonight.”

“About that...” he trails. “George and Ringo are sick.”

Brian’s eyes open up at the news. “Are you positive?”

“Yeah, Ringo’s got a headache and fever… I think, and George was throwin’ up.”

“Are they resting right now?”

“Yeah.” _ Or at least they’re trying, _Paul thinks.

“And, um, what about you?”

_ What about me? _ “Uh, ‘M just cold,” Paul replies uncertainly. “Why do you ask?”

“Nothing, just concerned for you,” he answers far too quickly. “I’ll figure something out, you just head back and make sure they rest up. And catch a kip yourself, alright?” The door closes, and Paul is left staring at it like an idiot.

Is Brian implying he’s sick as well? He looks down at his hands as he enters the room with George and freezes.

George is staring at him with his mouth gaping open.

Paul sees the_ bones in his hands_ and promptly screams.


	2. I'm Looking through you

8:14 AM

_ Holy shit holy shit holy shit-- _

Paul’s frantically trying to unbutton his shirt, but his hands are too sweaty to grip the buttons properly, so he forcefully yanks it open. Buttons fly everywhere as a cold sweat breaks out.

Paul can see his spine and ribcage through his torso and judging by Brian’s reaction earlier and George’s look of shock, he’s not the only one.

“What the hell’re yeh screamin’ about?” John's voice calls out from the other room, but Paul and George are too stunned to respond. When he comes out, his squinting eyes widen.

No one moves, too busy processing the information presented to them.

“Fuck, Paul...” he trails.

_ Yeah, fuck. _

“What am I supposed to do,” Paul asks as he collapses onto the couch, “like this?”

George suddenly remembered how to talk. “Hang on, okay? Eppy’ll--”

“Eppy’ll what? You should be resting,” the man in question states as he enters the room. “The same goes for you as well, Paul.”

Laughter erupts from John, but it’s not malicious, it’s manic. “You can see right through ‘im!”

Brian looks over to Paul, whose skin is starting to show a grayish hue. Brian can count the individual teeth showing through his lips.

He stands there, stuttering. “Are you alright?” he then questions.

“Aside from being transparent, you mean?” John snarks.

“I-, um, I’m fine, just a bit cold. Really cold, actually.” Paul replies nervously, looking at his manager. “I don’t feel sick, just a little weird.”

Brian and John look at him in confusion and then he realizes--

“Wait, aren’t you two freezing?”

“No,” they reply in unison and George’s eyebrows furrow. “You’re joking, right?” he asks.

“It’s rather warm in here, actually,” Brian says, and George frowns.

He looks over at Paul with worry. “Yeh sure? ‘Cos Paul’s cold and now he’s, y’know...” he trails, silently implying that his own skeleton might be on display soon.

“It’ll be fine,” Brian states, “I’ll arrange for someone to fill-in for Paul at the show and excuse him from the conference. Meanwhile, _ you, _” he points at George, “are going to sleep so that you can still play.”

“What about Paul? Call a doctor; the show should be the least of your worries!” George yells, but Brian argues back.

“You have an obligation to the thousands of people who bought tickets for the show, George. We can’t ignore our responsibilities just because of some hardships.”

He puts a hand on George’s shoulder and says: “Bed, now,” but George refuses to move.

“I’ve been tryin’ to fall asleep for hours, Eppy, but everything hurts too much to!” he whines, one hand on his stomach, the other gesturing at his throat.

“Ay! Ringo’s still sleepin’,” Paul calls, and everyone quiets down. John looks over. “Ringo’s sick, George’s hurtin’, and Paul’s see-through. There’s no way in hell any of them can play. Yer gonna have to cancel, Bri.”

Brian sighs and then moves to leave. “Just try to get better. I’m going to make some calls,” he says as he exits, leaving the other three.

George moves over to sit next to Paul. His skin is becoming even more translucent and has tints of blue.

Paul looks over to him. “What’s happening to me?”

John answers for George. “You look like a ghost,” and George nods.

“Yeah, it looks like your skin’s glowin’ a little.” Paul looks down at his words. His flesh, once pink and tan, is now a bioluminescent aqua color.

_ A ghost, huh? I’d believe it. _

“Makes sense,” John begins, “Considerin’ you couldn’t see yourself in the mirror. It’s probably why yer so cold.”

George huffs. “Then I’m one too because I can’t see myself either.”

“No, no, no,” John interrupts, “I’d be seeing yer bones if that was the case.”

“Please stop talking about it!” Paul shouts. _ I don’t want to think about me possibly being dead, _he mentally adds. “This is just a bad dream, okay? I’m going to take a kip and when I wake up, everything will be alright.” He exits the room before the other two can object.

In the bedroom, Ringo’s still sweaty, but he’s properly sleeping now. Paul climbs into John’s bed, not bothering to remove his clothes, and closes his eyes.

He can still see the room.

His eyelids are clear now, so he gets up to close the blinds and lays down again.

* * *

8:57 AM

He can’t fall asleep. His mind is drifting off, but his body isn’t shutting down.

_ Makes sense, you know. Why would a dead body need to sleep? _

Shut up! He’s not a ghost, that’s completely ridiculous! He just needs to think about something comforting right now so he can fall asleep. His mind is just too stressed out at the moment. 

Paul doesn’t know why his mother came to mind, but she did. He could see her, gazing at him from across the room. He loves her, but he also misses her, so thinking about her won’t help him sleep easier right now.

He tries to think of something or someone else when--

“Hello there--”

That’s her voice. _ That’s her voice! _

It’s not his thoughts, her voice just filled his ears just now!

He tries to sit up, to look at her better and to respond when he’s hit with vertigo.

It’s like the feeling you get when you’re laying in bed and you feel as though you’re falling. His mom disappears, and Paul feels his whole body falling. He sees the springs inside the bed, and the mattress layers, and the wooden support beams in the floor 

Before he knows it, he’s in the room below the one he was just in.

He crashes to the floor and takes shaky breaths to steady himself. He’s inhaling and exhaling at a rapid pace, but then he stops. He feels shaken up, but the biological symptoms, like his heart rate and breathing, are absent.

_ Oh, _ he realizes, _ I don’t have a heart or lungs. _

He looks up. The room he’s in is pristine, ready for someone else to stay in it. He must have phased through the bed and floor, and looking down, he sees that he’s phased through his clothes as well. 

There’s no doubt about it, he’s a ghost. The cold, the mirror, his mom, the phasing… It’s impossible to explain it any other way. Paul’s surprised at how calm he is, but then again, it seems there might be benefits.

Can he really talk to the dead? And can he really phase through walls?

Because if he can, if he really does have these powers, then it might not be so bad.

Testing it out, he bends his legs and jumps as high as he can. His body shoots up like he’s on the moon, like his whole body is weightless. There’s no impact with the ceiling and Paul finds himself floating in his hotel room again.

He can’t help it; he lets out a chuckle as Ringo stares at his spectral form with wide eyes.

“Hello Ringo, have a nice nap?” he asks.

Ringo stares at him. “I think I might still be dreamin’,” and Paul laughs again.

_ This might actually be rather nice, _he thinks as he puts his clothes back on. “The show tonight’s probably going to get canceled since you an’ George are sick, and I’m, well...”

Ringo just stares back, overwhelmed at the sight of Paul. His outline is smoky and wispy, and his skeleton is completely white and visible. Paul’s about to open the door to leave the room when he stops and walks right at it.

His body fades through, and his clothes start to go through as well.

_ That’s convenient, imagine having to strip every time I wanted to do that! _

John’s jaw drops “Christ, Macca, you’re really--”

“Dead? Yeah, it’s pretty fab, ain’t it?” he replies with a wink. George mutters _ As long as you’re okay with it _and lays back down. He looks ashen and pale, but he doesn’t seem to be ghostly like Paul. Not yet, anyway.

“Come on, fellas,” he says as he strolls to the door, “you look like you’ve seen a ghost!” he laughs as he walks not out the door, but through_ it. _

“Hey, wait up!” John yells as he follows him, leaving George and Ringo alone to be miserable.

_ Cheesy joke, _George lamely thinks, as he rises to follow the two.

“Where yeh goin’ to?” Ringo asks as he emerges from the hotel bedroom for the first time.

“Wherever Paul is, he’s gonna make a scene.”

“Is he, um, dead?” Ringo tentatively ponders.

“He’s gonna be if Eppy finds out we left,” George replies, and the two exit the room to follow.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> So Paul's a ghost now!
> 
> I picked a ghost because I thought it would be a cheeky reference to the "Paul is Dead" theory, and also how he seems to be the Beatle who enjoys the attention from the press. It's interesting, because he'd want to be seen the most, yet now he's literally the hardest one to see.
> 
> Next chapter: Here comes the Sun


	3. Here Comes the Sun

9:35 AM

“You can’t walk out like that! Everyone knows we’re staying at this hotel, the press’ll be all over you!”

“So? If I can’t see myself in a mirror, I doubt I’ll show up on any photographs,” Paul says behind him as he keeps moving. Huffing, John tries to grab him and turn him around when his hand goes right through Paul.

The younger man looks at John and laughs some more.

_ Cheeky bastard. _

“See? I don’t have to worry about anyone tryin’ to get a piece of me!” Paul pulls up his body with a newfound weightlessness and levitates in place, pretending to recline in an invisible chair.

John’s going to be honest; he was genuinely worried about Paul earlier. But now, seeing him show off all his strange abilities made him wish something bad_ had _happened. His ghostly transformation had gone straight to his head.

“What if someone tries to exorcise you?” George asks, catching up to the two with Ringo trailing behind him.

“Yeah Paul, what’ll you do then?” John eggs on.

“You two are completely overreacting,” Paul says. He then looks to Ringo. “Are you feeling alright there?”

“I’d ask yeh the same thing Paul. After all, you were the one who died.”

“I didn’t die, I’m just… not living right now,” he replies. “You didn’t answer my question.”

“I still feel a little under-the-weather, but it’s a lot better than before.” Ringo’s head still hurt, but it wasn’t the brain-splitting pain it was before. Earlier, it was as if he was in a room of thousands, all screaming at him. Now, it was as if only some of them were whispering.

“Anyway, Paul, you can’t go out,” George states, “because everyone’s going to scream their heads off.”

“They do that anyway! Honestly, what’s the worst that could happen? Everything’s going to be_ fine. _” Paul reassures.

**FineFineFineFineFineFineFineFineFineFineFineFineFineFineFine**

Ringo’s headache suddenly spikes and he winces in pain. It subsides, and he’s left with the other three staring at him in concern.

“You sure yer alright?” George asks, and Ringo shakes his head up-and-down slowly.

“I think I just need to get some fresh air,” Ringo says as he starts walking down the hallway. George doesn’t argue and the four of them make their way to the stairs so they can exit out the back door.

They open the door and the sunlight hits their faces.

Paul’s disappointed at how it does nothing to warm him.

George flinches.

“When was the sun so bright?” George would have given anything to get out of the freezing hotel, but it feels like the sun is baking him right now. His skin heats up as he takes off his jacket.

“Come on, Geo,” John calls as he drags George outside. “Let’s get something to eat.”

The thought of food should be reassuring, but it makes George feel ill. He’s pretty sure the pain is hunger, but the idea of eating breakfast makes him sick to his stomach.

He’s fairly certain that he might be a ghost like Paul, sharing some of his symptoms and all, so it makes sense that he doesn’t want to eat.

After all, ghosts don’t need to eat food; they’re already dead.

Ringo silently prays to himself that no one tries to bother them on their excursion, and then winces at his head again.

As they walk down the street, everyone stares at them. However, no one moves to stop them, too flabbergasted to do anything. Paul chuckles as a photographer clicks his camera at him. Paul’s certain he’s wasting his time. But other than that man, not a single soul approaches them. Plenty of people walk by without batting an eye.

What happened to the crowd of girls outside their window at three-thirty in the morning? Why is everyone so tame?

Not wanting to push their luck, they go into the first place they see. It’s a small diner, packed full of people trying to get a quick plate of eggs before they go to work. It looks like every table is taken, and the servers are running frantically to serve everyone.

In other words, the worst place for The Beatles to go to. They’re about to turn and exit when a server with way too much lipstick approaches them with menus in hand.

“Hello, welcome to Jackson’s! Please follow me to your seats,” she says, smiling from ear-to-ear. She quickly wipes up a table for four and puts down the menus. “My name’s Molly and I’ll be back to get your orders in a minute.” And just like that, she’s off to the other end of the diner.

The four sit at the table and stare dumbly at each other. And then they erupt into laughter.

“How the _ hell, _ ” John begins in between chuckles, “do you serve The Beatles _ and a ghost, _” pointing at Paul, “and not notice!?”

It’s the most unbelievable thing that happened today, and that in-and-of-itself is impressive. Their giggles die down, and focus turns to the menus.

Paul puts his down after a moment. “I don’t think I need to eat. Or if I even _ can _eat.”

George nods and puts his down as well. “I doubt I can eat either.”

“Sure you can, yer still human,” Paul says.

“‘M pretty sure I’m dead like you. The cold, the mirror… Not to mention I threw up that coffee earlier.”

“Oh god, I couldn’t handle two of you having ghost powers,” John says, still looking at the menu. 

“If he was a ghost, he’d be glowing too!” Paul objects.

“If I wasn’t a ghost, I would be able to see my reflection,” George intones. Although his symptoms are annoying at best and unbearable at worst, the idea of having powers is alluring. If he could phase through walls, he gladly accept being cold all the time for it.

Paul opens his mouth again when the waitress comes back.

“Hello there, are you ready to order?”

John straightens up. “I’ll have… um… the eggs and toast with the sausage,” he says, pointing at his menu, “and the pancakes as well with orange juice.” Molly quickly jots down his order and then her attention turns to Ringo.

“Oh, um,” he stutters, as he was spacing out for the past two minutes. “Can I have some pancakes and juice too, please?”

“Of course you can! And you, sir?” she asks, looking at Paul.

“I’m not hungry or thirsty for anything,” he says with a polite smile. George pipes up. “Can I just have some toast?” She writes down the orders and leaves as quickly as she came.

“You really ordered a lot, John,” Paul says as soon as she’s gone.

“Well, that ‘cos I’m really hungry!”

“I bet it’s rough, not being able to eat,” Ringo adds, but Paul just shrugs.

“You’d think it is, but I don’t really miss it.”

George frowns. Paul’s not hungry in the slightest? Because he’s certainly starving right now, but the thought of his toast disgusts him. He has no time to ponder it anymore because Molly’s back with a large tray. Didn’t they just order their food?

“If there’s anything you need, just call me,” she says as she puts all the food down and hustles over to another table. John spares no time digging in, wolfing down his food at a startling pace. Ringo digs in quickly too because the food looks surprisingly good for how fast it came out while George sits there.

He picks up a slice of toast and takes a bite.

And then spits it out as it turns to ash in his mouth. 

It’s fucking toast and he can’t even keep it down. George’s hunger spikes and he buries his head in his arms.

“You okay?” John asks with a mouth full of food, “And are yeh gonna finish that?”

“Take it,” George mumbles, and John shoves the toast into his mouth. _ Of course, he’s more concerned about the food than me… _

**NotTrueNotTrueNotTrueNotTrueNotTrueNotTrueNotTrueNotTrue**

George straightens as a voice rings out in his skull. The chatter of the diner is like a wall of sound, yet that voice, whatever it was, rang clearly. 

“Did any of you hear that?” he asks. Paul shakes his head, while John keeps eating, ignoring the question. 

Ringo stares at him. “What did it sound like?”

“It’s like,” George pauses as he tries to find the right words, “like a voice spoke to me in my head. Kept saying ‘Not true, not true.’” Ringo’s eyebrows shoot up. “Did it sound like a bunch of voices speaking at once?” George nods and Ringo continues. “I heard it too, ever since this morning, it gets worse with the headache.”

“Well hold on, I didn’t hear anything,” Paul interrupts. “What’s this about voices?”

“When I woke up this morning, it was like a crowd was screaming in me ears. It’s still there, but a lot more quiet.”

“I don’t think I have the same thing as you, I only just heard it once,” George comments.

“I bet whatever it is, it has something to do with this ghost thing,” Paul says as he gestures at himself, “and maybe why everyone’s so tame today.”

“I thought it was because it’s Monday,” George jokes.

“Isn’t it Saturday, though?”

“I have no clue.”

Ringo decides to finish off his breakfast as Paul and George use deductive reasoning to figure out what day it is. John’s polishing off his plate, and Ringo’s certain he actually licked it clean.

Yeah, things are pretty odd right now, but it looks like it’ll all work out. 

Contented, he digs into his stack of pancakes.

* * *

10:12 AM

It’s not working out.

Scratch that, _ it’s really not working out. _

They paid for their meal and began to make their way back to the hotel room when George started to lag behind.

“It’s August, why is it so damn hot?” he complained.

“It’s not that bad, yeh git!” John yelled. Ringo was about to agree when he looked at George. His skin was red, already sunburnt from the meager amount of time they spent outside.

That’s not normal.

He’s about to ask George if he’s alright when he hears a bizarre sound.

It sounds like a kettle going off mixed with the crackling of a bonfire. Ringo has never heard a sound like that before, but before he can ponder it, George screams.

His hands fly up to cover his face and he darts.

He looks like a bullet with how fast he moved. His body was no more than a black smudge to Ringo, only visible for a second. John quickly chases after him, and they find George convulsing in an alleyway. His skin looks charred and black, and wisps of smoke rise.

The most alarming thing isn’t how his flesh seemed to have caught aflame, but what happened to his eyes.

They’re dilated and blood red, vibrant against his ash-grey skin.

“Tell me I’m just dreaming,” he begs, and the others can’t help but stare at his elongated fangs.

Ringo flinches again as the voices in his head start up again.

**FuckFuckFuckFuckFuckFuckFuckFuckFuckFuckFuckFuckFuckFuckFuckFuck**

“Sorry, George, but this isn’t a dream,” Paul starts. “I think yer a vampire.”

George bitterly laughs. “Of course I am,” he snarks. “How’re we gonna get back now?”

Paul shrugs off his jacket. “Just drape this over yer head.”

George does as he says and puts his jacket back on to cover his arms. With his hands into his pockets and the jacket on his head, none of his skin is exposed. Granted, he can’t see, but he won’t die anymore, so he has to comply. Paul reaches to lead him by the hand, but he accidentally phases through George’s arm.

“Just let Ringo lead me,” he says. John tries to take George’s hand but he swipes it away.

“I don’t trust you, Lennon!” John laughs as Ringo takes George’s arm and they all move out. It’s an awkward walk, with George stumbling blindly, but they get to the hotel’s back door without much issue.

The surrounding buildings are tall enough to block out any sunlight, so George removes his makeshift helmet. He reaches for the door handle-

-and accidentally rips it clean off the door.

“Way to go,” John sneers. George just huffs and grabs the door by the hole he just made and tears it off its hinges.

“So vampires have super-strength…” Paul mutters.

It slams loudly to the ground and the four hustle inside. As they make their way up, Ringo notices how George’s skin has already healed. It’s now only slightly pink, like a light burn scar. It’s remarkable considering how charred it was before. 

“George, I think vampires can regenerate, too. Look at yerself.” George looks down at his hands and examines them. “Ain’t that neat?” Ringo asks, trying to cheer up George.

“Not really. Paul has neat powers as well, but he doesn’t have to worry about dying in the sun,” George mutters quietly to Ringo. 

_ It’s not fair at all, _George thinks.

“It might not be fair, but I think there’s a bright side to all this,” Ringo says.

George hesitates because he’s certain he didn’t say his thoughts out loud, but Ringo’s always been really good at reading others. “Thanks, Ringo,” he says before John quickly turns around.

“I think you mean _ Fang _ks, Ringo!” He says with a wide grin and Paul giggles. George frowns at his awful pun, but can’t stop the corners of his mouth from smirking. It’s the exact kind of distraction he needs.

They reach the hotel room and realize none of them brought a key with them. George reaches for the door when Paul stops him.

“Hold on, you can’t go breaking every door! Allow me,” he says as he puts his hand through the door and unlocks it from the inside. He opens it with a flourish and then jumps when he sees Brian inside.

“Hello, boys. Have a nice excursion?” he asks, an ominous smile on his face.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> And now George is a vampire!
> 
> Next chapter: Run for your Life


	4. Run for Your Life

10:34 AM

“The nerve of you four! I honestly can’t believe you did that!” Brian shouted, angrily pacing around the room.

“I honestly can’t believe yer still yelling,” John replies from the couch. Brian had been at it for a while now, ever since they had come back. The man looked like his head was about to explode. 

"Honestly, it's not that big a deal, no cared that we were walking around," Paul says, mindlessly flipping through a magazine. He glances up at George, who’s standing eerily still.

"It doesn't matter now, since I already canceled," Brian says, "but that's when I thought three of you were sick!"

Ringo exhaled through his nose. "You'll cancel if we're sick, but not if we're transforming into monsters?" He looks over at George who is resting his head against the wall, as far from the windows as possible. He lowers his voice. "George isn't in a good spot right now."

The lad in question doesn't move at the mention of his name. It seems as though something is eating at him, and Ringo wonders what it is.

“George? Are you alright?” Brian asks. No reply.

Ringo’s about to repeat Brian’s question when the voices in his mind spike, like a nail being driven through his skull.

**HungerHungerHungerThirstItHurtsItHurtsStopPleaseThePainGodStopStarvingNeedToStopPleaseHungerHungerBloodNeedPainBlood**

**neEDBloODNnnooooOoOWWwWWWWWWwWWWWWWWWWWWWW**

_ Oh god, _ Ringo thinks, _ that's George's voice! _

He can see George's thoughts right now, and they are blinding his eyes. They're frantic and blurry, but they all heavily feature the color red.

The color of blood.

_ George? Is it really you? _

The screaming quiets for a moment and he thinks George is calming down, but then it starts again.

**GetOutGetOutGetOutGetOutGetOutDieGetOutGetOutGetOutDieDieGetOutGetOut-**

It’s louder now, as if George was screaming his throat raw in Ringo’s ears and inside his brain. He feels George’s spirit rising and he’s hit with an abnormal fear, chilling him to the bone. It’s almost as if George’s mind is about to physically attack him.

_ Stop! _

It’s all Ringo could think in his panic. He never had a reason to fear George, but the voices screaming inside his skull are terrifying. 

He’s so shaken up that it hadn’t even registered to him that George fell unconscious.

Paul says something, but Ringo can’t hear it at all. His heart is thumping in his chest too much to hear anything.

“...ingo? Ringo? Are you still there?” Paul’s voice cuts through. 

“I did that,” he stutters, shaking in place. “Paul, I did that! George, he’s-”

“Who cares about George! Look at yerself!” Paul yells at him, pointing at his forehead. Ringo doesn’t know what he means until he notices that he can see Paul’s finger pointed straight at him.

With his third eye, centered in the middle of his forehead.

Ringo gets up and dashes to the hotel bathroom so he can look at his reflection. However, when he reached for the door handle, he finds he can’t grip it at all. His hands have been transformed into a mass of tentacles.

“Oh no, please don’t!” he begs an imaginary entity, as more tentacles appear all over himself. “This can’t be happening!”

“Hey, Ringo! Calm down! Deep breaths, deep breaths, okay?”

_ O-okay. _

“Alright, inhale-”

Ringo takes in a shaky breath.

“Exhale-”

It comes out as a creaky groan.

“Paul...” Ringo whines. “What’s happening to me?”

“Hey, it’s going to be alright, it’s already better now. The tentacles are going away,” he soothes, and as Ringo looks down, he watches as they morph back into his flesh.

“Ah, so yer a freak too now, huh Rings?” John calls from the couch, clearly amused at the situation. “Aren’t yeh glad yeh canceled, Eppy?”

Brian frowns. “Yeah, but,” he licks his lips, “What about you, John?”

“What about me?” he asks, while Paul and Ringo tend to George, dragging him into an armchair to rest.

“The other three have these… _ mutations, _so shouldn’t we assume you’ll change too?”

Everyone stares at John, and he chuckles in response.

“I don’t think so, they all woke up feeling sick and cold and whatnot. I’m not ill at all. In fact, I feel better than usual.” He chuckles, but no one joins in. “Shouldn’t you blokes be more worried about Ringo and George?”

“You said you knocked him out?” Paul asks, looking at Ringo.

“Yeah, I was in his mind,” he says, “I was scared, though. He-”

Ringo takes a nervous breath. “I think he needs to drink blood to live.”

Paul stares at him for a moment. “What… are you implying exactly?”

“He was screaming in his head about how hungry he is, about how he needs blood. I think he was about to hurt me when I, um, knocked him out.”

“How’d yeh do that?” John asks.

“I just thought it, I suppose,” he hums. “Wait, do you think the reason no one noticed us today-”

“-was because you thought of it?” Paul finishes. “If that was the case...”

“Then Ringo might be a lot stronger now than we think,” John says, a grim look on his face.

Ringo can hear his thoughts clearly. _ I bet he could walk right up to the bank and ask for all their money. _

_ I probably could, _Ringo thinks back. John jumps, pointing at Ringo. “Don’t do that!”

“Do what?” he asks, with a smirk.

“You were just in me head!”

“It’s not my fault you’re a loud thinker.”

Brian sighs. “Listen, boys, please just try to lay low. I’ll figure something out, just don’t go anywhere.” He runs his hands through his hair while exiting the room. There’s no precedent for what just happened, and Brian has no idea what he’ll say to the press. Honestly, he’s just hoping that maybe they’ll wake up tomorrow back to normal.

Meanwhile, Ringo decides to delve back into George’s mind. It’s unconscious now, so it’s a lot more quiet than before.

If he can knock out George, then he can probably wake him back up, and more importantly, he might be able to help George tune out his terrible hunger.

He’s never done this before, so he closes his three eyes, already used to the odd sensation on his forehead, and dives right in.

* * *

11:57 AM

It’s almost noon now, and Ringo was still in his trance. Paul and John decided to try and do some songwriting, but there was just too much on their minds. Paul scratches out the same set of lyrics for the ninth time and leans back into the couch.

And then he falls straight through it and onto the floor.

“I give up, this is just too much,” he moans. “Are George and Ringo…?”

“Still asleep? Yeah,” John huffs as he flips to another page in his notebook. “Yer a ghost right? Why can’t you just possess him and get him to move?”

“Possession?”

“Yeah, going inside someone and taking over their body.”

“The thought hadn’t crossed my mind,” he replies, eyes trained on George. _ Would it help him wake up? _“No harm in trying, I suppose.”

Paul stands up and walks over to the armchair George is in. He concentrates and then sits in such a way so that he doesn’t phase through the chair, but he does phase through George, lining up their outlines. He can feel the layers of George’s internals inside him and shudders at the sensation. He closes his eyes, tries to concentrate and-

“What the hell do you think you’re doing?” he hears. Paul jumps up, accidentally brushing the ceiling.

“George! You’re up!”

“Yeah, I was really-” he lets out a huge yawn, “-really out of it. Feel better though.”

Ringo’s eyes open up as well. “Heya, Georgie, how’re yeh feeling?”

“Better,” he says. _ Almost like a normal person again... _

“Well, yeh missed the big show. Ringo’s got mind powers now,” John says.

“I know. I saw all of his thoughts.”

That was surprising to Ringo. Apparently, his mental powers work both ways. He can see the thoughts of others, so it only makes sense the others can see into his thoughts as well.

_ I guess I’ll have to be careful about who’s head I go into then, _he thought.

“I think I’m gonna go and practice this whole mind-thing for a while,” he says, and Paul stands up to follow.

With them out of earshot, George stretches out and moves to the couch next to John.

“What were yeh up to while we were out?” he asks.

“Tried to write something, but...” he trails, gesturing at his notebook. On its pages are miscellaneous doodles. One of them is a classic ghost that looks like a sheet. It has dopey eyes, so he assumes it has to be Paul. There’s a doodle of Ringo as an octopus with three eyes, and one of himself with bat wings.

“Does it bother you?” George asks.

“Does what bother me?”

“Not transforming.”

John shakes his head. “Not at all. I rather like going outside in the sunlight and not having a headache.” George frowns. “I think being a ghost would be gear though. Paul got the best deal out of you three.”

“Yeah. He did,” George says, head turning to face the television. He turns it on and settles into his seat. “I guess I’ll just have to get used to it,” he mutters, and John is certain his voice wavered for a second. He watches as George edges slightly closer to him, and he knows the younger lad is looking for some physical comfort.

_ Too bad, kid, _he thought. He wasn’t his mom, he wouldn’t cuddle with George. He gets all the physical affection he needs when he sleeps already. It would be easier to count the times George didn’t try to hug you subconsciously.

Then again, it’s probably really rough for him right now. He’ll never be able to go out in daylight again, which would make living as a normal human being impossible. 

John pretends to stretch out his arms and drapes one behind George’s shoulders. George leans into the contact and they watch television to pass the time.

* * *

1:37 PM

They call Ringo out of the bedroom to eat the room service they ordered. George is pleasantly surprised that he’s not feeling the pangs of hunger anymore and he’s certain Ringo has something to do with it. John had ordered three dishes, one for Ringo and the rest for himself.

“If you keep eating like that, you’ll get fat,” George jokes.

“A little indulgence never hurt anyone,” John says as he shoves more chips into his mouth.

Ringo lets out a laugh to hide his nervousness. He can feel the energies of all the people around him right now, and something about John’s wavelength shifted when he started eating.

_ It’s probably just my imagination, _he hoped.

* * *

4:00 PM

“It’s four’o’clock now,” George commented from the couch.

“Why does time move so slow?” John complained from his spot on the floor.

“Why’re you two just waiting? You could be writing songs or playing music,” Paul states as he emerges from the bedroom.

“Not in the mood,” they simultaneously reply.

“Yeah, I can understand why. I tried talking to the dead, y’know.”

“And how’d it go?” John asks.

“Not well, have you ever tried talking to a dead person?”

“No, not really.”

“Well, that’s ‘cos they’re_ depressing. _Not a single one was happy, talking about all their regrets or how they died horribly and alone.”

“Yeah, that sounds about right.”

* * *

5:22 PM

The four of them sat around, waiting for time to pass.

“Oh, that’s interesting,” George commented.

“What is?”

“I don’t have a heartbeat.”

“Oh. Me neither.”

“Cool.”

And then they fell back into silence.

* * *

8:31 PM

“We would be on the way to the concert by now,” Ringo starts, “If none of this happened.”

John hummed, and then kicked off the floor. “Alright, I’m sick of lying about! Ringo, let’s go!” he suddenly shouts.

“Why me?” he asks.

“Because you can turn off people’s heads so they don’t see us! Let’s go to a bar, come on!” He then looks over to Paul and George. “You two are invited too, yeh look like yeh need to get out.”

Honestly, fresh air could do them all some good, so they file out after John, but not before Ringo thinks really hard about how he wants no one to notice them.

They walk out of the hotel’s main lobby and onto the street with wide smiles (or in George’s case, a smirk) across their faces. Luckily, it’s night out, so George doesn’t have to worry about being burned alive.

“Way to go, Rings!” Paul cheers as they walk down the sidewalk. “I’m honestly a little jealous.”

They make their way down to the nearest bar and waltz right on in.

It’s dirty, loud, and smelly, but none of that discourages John from immediately ordering a drink. Ringo is about to order one for himself when John stops him.

“Hold on there, if yeh drink, who’s to say that you’ll keep messing with people’s heads?”

“What’s that supposed to mean?”

“He’s worried you won’t be able to keep up the mental block if you’re a little buzzed,” Paul clarifies.

He concedes and looks out across the crowd of people dancing to the music played live. _ I wonder if being drunk would alter my powers, _ he thinks. The thought of him losing control, however, froze him in his tracks. _ What if… what if I accidentally erase someone’s memories? Or put them in a coma? _He doesn’t know the extent of his powers; there’s a decent chance he could damage someone’s mind, permanently.

He’s content with watching the bar. Within a few minutes, Paul’s in the middle of the crowd, shaking his head and going wild. Even though his Beatle-ness and ghost-ness are invisible to the crowd, they still give him plenty of attention. _ It’s true, he is the cute one, _he thinks and then scans the crowd for George. He was very reserved earlier in the hotel, but now he’s gyrating, shaking his hips. It seems all he needed was a pretty girl to dance with him. He’s got a big grin on his face, and although his monstrous fangs are sticking out, he’s forgotten all about them in his pleasure.

Ringo’s about to join them after a while, but then he feels a shift in the air. It takes a moment to realize it’s the mental wavelengths of the people surrounding him.

It’s John. He’s laughing, surrounded by a large pile of empty glasses, but there’s a hoarseness to his voice.

“Heeeeeeeeeeyyyyyyy, Ringo! Wha’re yeh standin’ ‘round for, yeh git!”

“God, John, how much did you drink?”

“Just enough to enjoy meself! And I feel fuckin’ great_! _” He laughs again, but it’s more deranged, more raw. Ringo feels the cold chill of fear overtake him and the wavelengths shift again.

He goes straight into John’s mind, to figure out what’s wrong, but it’s like trying to pierce a tornado with a paper airplane. John’s mind isn’t even forming words, it’s just a primal, guttural roar.

His laughter turns into screaming and panting which then turns into choking. He’s on the floor now, convulsing with both pain and pleasure, and Ringo screams out with his mind.

_ Paul! George! _

But it’s too late. John’s bulking out, shredding his clothes with his massive frame. New muscles are growing into him and tearing his flesh apart with their sheer size. He can hear the bones in his body snap and crack as they rearrange themselves. Auburn fur is pushing itself through his skin and John keeps screaming in agony as it happens. Teeth become fangs, and nails become claws as John’s face elongates to make a wolf-human head hybrid, and the base of his spine juts out to form a tail. 

**RunRunRunRunRunRunRunRunRunRunRunRunRunRunRunRunRunRun**

It’s all Ringo hears before John looks at Ringo with his golden, predator eyes and _ roars. _

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> So Ringo is a lovecraftian monster and John is a werewolf now-
> 
> I was thinking that it'd be fitting for Ringo's powers to be mental, since he's physically the weakest (or shortest) and also then I gave him tentacles since, y'know, octopus's garden and all.
> 
> John's got a raw deal with the whole werewolf thing, although I don't know if he or George has it worse. He seems to have the worse temper out of the three, so a berserk animal transformation fits.


	5. Mister Moonlight

8:58 PM

It happens in a second. John rears up his claws and slashes at Ringo, and he flinches and covers his head with his arms. He's surprised to see himself unharmed, as George had swooped in at the last second and took the hit for him.

George gets slammed into the wall with the force of a truck. He has never been hit by a car, but he imagines it would feel a lot like what he's feeling now. John's way stronger now, and is already beginning to attack again.

Patrons are running and screaming as John howls and lunges.

Seeing his friend in danger snaps Ringo out of his stupor and he tries to stop John from within his mind.

**RRRAAAAAAGGGHHHGGHHHHHHHHH-**

No luck, there's nothing even remotely human left in there.

_ George! I can't stop him, it's up to you! _

He can't see George's reaction right now, because John is beating him into the ground. There's a crater in the floor and it's only getting deeper. Everytime he hears the sound of John's punches, a gasp of pain from George follows. Ringo looks into the crowd for Paul and sees that he's frozen to the spot.

_ Paul! _

Paul looks back at Ringo, fear apparent on his features. He's terrified and clearly wants to get away, but he turns around at Ringo's call to help John.

John's massive form rushes towards the doors to escape, tired of beating George. Surprisingly, he just rises out of the divot in the earth, as if he merely tripped and wasn't just beaten into the floor by a 300 pound werewolf.

He looks roughed up, but the bruises from John's assault are already healing. He dashes out, and Ringo sees firsthand that George's abilities are in a league of their own.

He might be physically weaker than John, but he's faster and smaller. When he flings himself at John to drive him back, he's like a bullet, slamming into John with incredible force.

John goes flying at the impact and before he can strike back, George cracks him in the jaw. The two are now slugging it out, blow for blow. At the rate they're going, one of them is bound to die.

_ This isn't good, Paul! We need to do something! _

_ I know!  _ Paul mentally yells back. Then-

_ I have an idea, but I need you to calm down John.  _

_ I would if I could; he's just an animal right now!  _ Ringo shouts.

_ Just do your best!  _ Paul says (thinks) as he runs straight at John and goes into him. Phasing through his body, Paul can feel his being start to blend into John's. He can also feel Ringo mind swarming around John, and the fear and panic surrounding both of them.

It feels like Paul's in a vacuum, pulling at him and spinning him. He's so disoriented by the sensation, he doesn't realize that he feels a heartbeat now.

John's heart is slamming in his ribcage, blood pumping through his veins.

"It worked!" he yells in excitement, air pushing through his lungs. Paul was a ghost for less than a day, yet he already had forgotten what it felt like to breathe.

Ringo's eyes are pulsating, and George is bleeding, but they finally stopped John.

"Paul? That you?" George pants, voice hoarse.

"Of course it's me! John can't talk now, can he?" he responds.

"Lads, we need to get out of 'ere, now," Ringo says, arms morphing back into tentacles. He didn't even realize they had changed. "The police are coming."

Paul nods and gets up to walk.

And then promptly crashes into the ground.

His vision is blurry and dizzy. John's body is too disproportionate, with broad human-like arms and torso, yet thinner wolf legs. When Paul tries to stand, the pressure on his ankles is too much. He has to walk on his toe-pads, which is counter-intuitive to how he's walked his entire life.

_ How can John fight George like that, yet I can't even walk? His body is too top-heavy now.  _

They leave the bar, with Paul/John stumbling and tripping, while George is limping.

"I thought you'd could regenerate," Paul says through John's new, husky voice, panting with exhaustion. It's hard being in this body; it feels like something is constantly trying to push him out.

"I am, John just roughed me up real bad," he replies.  _ Thank goodness I can too, because I'm certain my ribcage is crushed,  _ he thinks. "Hey Ringo, can you make sure no one sees us?"

"Working on it right now," Ringo says. He puts up the mental block he used twice already, and the three make it back to the room.

* * *

10:07 PM

"Do you think he'll change every night?" George asks, wincing at his still broken ribs.

"I don't know, but I hope not," Ringo replies. He looks into the other room to see John, still in his beastly form, unconscious on the bed. Next to him is Paul, no more than a pale outline, flickering. Ringo fidgets with his tentacles.

"Why did all of this happen to us?" George quietly asks.

"I don't know," is all he can say in response.

George moves to light a cigarette, but puts it down soon after taking a drag from it. "Do you want it? 'Does nothing for me," he says as he offers it to Ringo.  _ Can't even enjoy a lousy cigarette,  _ he thinks.

"Everything's going to be fine,"Ringo starts as he takes the cigarette. "I don't think this happened randomly, I think there's a reason for it."

"Maybe someone just wants us to suffer," George mutters, before getting up and going to the bedroom. Ringo knows he can't sleep, but George just wants to be alone.

Without the distraction of their new magical powers, reality was beginning to set in. The only one of them that can live a normal life is Ringo, and maybe Paul, but John and George? There's no way they'd be able to lead normal lives. Even though his powers are grand, he would give it up in a heartbeat so his friends wouldn't have to suffer.

Glancing at the clock, Ringo decides to go to sleep. It's just been too long of a day, for all of them. He curls up on the couch and slowly falls asleep.

* * *

5:59 AM

"I feel like shit," John moans as he rises. "...the fuck happened last night?"

"You drank too much," George says, not looking at John.

"Explains my hangover."

_ It's because yer a werewolf,  _ Ringo thinks, but then regrets it as John locks eyes with him.

"What?" he asks.

"Nothing!"

"I'm a werewolf?"

"Ringo, you hafta stop thinking so loudly," George says.

"What  _ the fuck happened?! _ " John yells.

"It's fine, no one got hurt!"

"I got hurt."

"But yer a vampire so it's fine! Please, John, just stay calm!"

"It still hurts y'know!" 

"Yer ribs're still broken?" Ringo asks.

"No they healed, but-"

"Then it's fine!"

"Wait, I broke his  _ ribs?! _ "

"Yeah, you need to apologize for that," George spits at John.

**StopStopStopStopStopStopStopStopStop**

A torrent of voices and thoughts hit John and George, and they quiet down.

"You turned into a werewolf, beat up George, an' Paul possessed yeh," Ringo quickly explains. "But yeh didn't hurt anyone else, promise."

John just sighs and runs his hands through his hair. It feels shaggier now.

"I just-  _ fuck! _ " John curses as he kicks the wall. "What the hell am I supposed to do?"

"Well, I'd start by putting on some clothes," George says, and John looks down at himself. He didn't even notice he was nude.  _ Was I always this hairy?  _ "Can you check on Paul for me?" Ringo asks, and John goes into the bedroom.

Paul's on the bed, but his vibrant blue glow is closer to a pale sky color.

"'Ey, Macca, yeh alright?"

His translucent eyelids open. "Yeah, I'm jus' really out of it. You?"

"As fine as I can be right now," he grumbles as he kicks up a pair of pants off the floor.

Paul stares at John's naked form. He's certain that he's bulkier than before, and he's positive that John did not have visible abs before either.

His suspicions are proven true when John can't get the clothes to fit. He must've gained some height as well.

_ Fuck, he's probably taller than me now. _

"So," John starts with a big grin, "you were inside me last night?"

Paul involuntarily blushes at his words. "Oh god, please phrase that differently." His cheeks are glowing a brighter blue than usual.

"I bet it felt  _ reeeeaaaaal nice.  _ My body, surrounding yours, I bet it was nice and warm and  _ tight- _ "

"John, stop!" Paul yells, his blush intensifying, and they both giggle at the euphemism.

They settle down, and John keeps rooting around for some clothes. He then clears his throat. "We're sure fucked up, ey mate?"

Paul sighs. "Yeah, we are."

They fall into silence until John finally found something that can fit him and leaves the room. Paul hefts his weightless body and opens the door, too tired to use his powers and phase through.

Ringo's on the couch, all three eyes pulsating. George is next to him with a concerned look on his face. They're both deathly silent, when Ringo suddenly gasps.

"Something's wrong," he says as he struggles to breathe.

"What's going on?" Paul asks as he enters.

"The brain waves or something, I don't know, they're different," George attempts to explain, but Paul doesn't understand.

"What're yeh-" he starts.

"The TV! Turn it on!" Ringo interrupts, and George is already flipping through the channels.

... _ we have a warrant for the arrest of… _

George feels the dead weight of his heart sink to his stomach.

_ ...wanted for the assault of several civilians and the destruction... _

"This is some kind of a joke, right? Some big prank?" Paul asks, looking at the others in disbelief.

_ ...the public is already calling for the police to apprehend them at their current… _

John clenches his jaw, trying to fight off the urge to tear everything around him into pieces.

_ ...the four suspects, John Lennon, Paul McCartney, George Harrison, and Ringo Starr, are wanted for their crimes against humanity. _

"Someone did this to us," he grits out, "and they are going to pay."

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This is going to get more intense


	6. You've Got to Hide Your Love Away

???

** _It’s all our fault, Paul._ **

** _Don’t say that!_ **

** _But it’s true, innit? If we had never come over here, he would’ve far happier back home with his family. He would be better off, not in the hospital._ **

** _John, I… I understand what you’re saying but-_ **

** _There’s nothing you can say. It’s our fault; don’t lie to yourself about it._ **

* * *

6:17 AM

“We need to go,  _ now, _ ” Paul says, but no one moves. Especially not John, whose body is trembling right now. He watches as hair, no,  _ fur  _ starts to grow out of his flesh. 

“Shit, John, calm down, please!” he begs, and John’s transformation halts. He looks over at Paul, and his now yellow eyes are boring holes into him.

“Why the hell should I calm down?!”

“Because we need to go down and explain to them the truth!”

“What truth?” George mutters. “The fact that we’re abominations? What’s the point?”

“What are you talking about? We’re just ordinary people who got wrapped up in-” Paul hesiates “-whatever the hell this all is! We didn’t hurt anyone, and we can clear things up before they can get any worse!”

George doesn’t move, but Ringo can hear the words he wants to scream out. 

_ It hurts, y'know? You think you can just smile and chase your problems away but you can't. I'll still be like this, still in pain, but you wouldn't even notice, would you? _

_ I can't go outside anymore, I can't live my life the way I wanted to. There's no fixing this. We have to live like this everyday for the rest of our lives. And you keep trying to pretend, to lie, that's it's all fine. _

_ Do you even care about us? About me? _

It was wrong to go around in other people’s heads. Especially George’s, which was flooded with a terrible anguish. Before he could try to reassure the lad, he felt a crowd of people gathered outside the hotel.

They were full of hate, anger, and fear, and all of it was directed at them. Worse still, when Ringo tried to enter their minds, he couldn’t get in.

Something or someone had to be doing this. There’s no other way these people’s minds would altered like this. It was like a hivemind, all of them wanted the same thing: to see The Beatles. Most likely to hurt them.

A brick breaks through the window and misses John's head by a few inches.

“You want to negotiate with  _ them?  _ They want to kill us!” John shouts, and Paul flinches. “Then we’ll just have to escape then.”

“How the hell're we supposed to do that?" John demands. "There's a crowd outside both the door and the window."

"It's overcast right now," Paul's says.

"What does that have to do with anything? No one gives a damn 'bout the weather!" 

"The sun's covered. George can go out," Paul clarifies, and the three turn to George.

"Can you? Go outside right now? Ringo asks, and George rises. He goes to the broken window and opens it.

They all see him wince, but he's not erupting into flames, so it's good enough for their purposes.

"Are we seriously doing this? George gonna shuttle us out of town?" John asks, and Paul answers. "We have to, Ringo's powers obviously don't work, and the people out there won't let us go out."

"Me powers worked fine yesterday, though. I think something else messed with their heads," Ringo says.

George huffs. "Just get on."

"Yeh can't carry three of us at once-"

"I can: John, yeh get on my back, I'll pick up Ringo, and Paul's weightless, so he can jus' hang on."

"Both of us at once?" John asks, and George nods. He hesitantly climbs onto George's back and is surprised to see him handle the weight. George looks frail and skinny, while John himself had bulked up, yet it's like he's just wearing a backpack. He picks up Ringo like he's a pillow, and Paul latches onto his back, partially phased through John. 

"This is stupid, how're yeh gonna get out of 'ere?"

George jumps up onto the windowsill. "Like this," he says, and jumps all the way across the street and onto the rooftop of another building. He then starts sprinting across the rooftops, towards the East. Ringo feels nauseous, and John is hanging on for dear life, but they're escaping the city.

The crowd of people gathered at the hotel screams at the sight of them fleeing. Some ran to their cars to pursue, but the rest followed on foot.

George was far too fast for anyone to keep up. They were already nearing the edge of the city, when the clouds parted and the sun rose.

"George! You have to stop!" Paul screamed, afraid of George burning.

"It doesn't hurt, I can still-" George began before his skin began to blacken. Smoke was pouring out of his flesh, yet he kept on moving.

"Please, George!" Ringo shouts, and George finally draws still. He drops down into an alleyway and puts Ringo down.

John and Paul climb off of him. "Why the hell did yeh keep going? You could have died!" Paul scolds, and George looks down.

"I was jus'- jus' trying to get away."

_ Like you asked of me. I was just trying to please you. _

Ringo shuddered. George's thoughts were pushing into his head now.

"We'll get a car, okay? Stay here, we'll pick you up," Paul commands and moves out. 

"A car? We're really going on the run?" Ringo asks.

"There's nothing else to do. Everyone hates us, mate," John resigns, and moves to follow Paul.

Stealing a car was easy; Paul just had to phase through the door. John hotwires it, and they pick up George and head out.

* * *

** _???_ **

** _How did you let it get this bad? He hasn’t eaten in two weeks!_ **

** _I thought it was just, y’know, stress or something._ **

** _He was dying right before your eyes! And none of you even care!_ **

** _I’m sorry, we’ll take better care of him-_ **

** _No you won’t, because you won’t even get the chance. He’s going to go home as soon as he recovers._ **

** _But, what about the band?_ **

** _The band should be the least of your concerns right now._ **

* * *

11:55 AM

_ What was that just now? Who were those voices? _

As Paul wondered what the conversation in his head was, the car began to drift. 

“Ey, Paul, yer about to drive off the road!” Ringo yells, snapping him back to reality.

Paul jerks the car back in between the lines of the highway. “Sorry, spaced out for a second.”

They had been driving for hours now, just trying to get away from any civilization. Paul had been behind the wheel, with Ringo in shotgun. John laid sprawled out in the back, and George was curled up with a blanket draped over him to keep out the sun.

“How’re you two doing back there?” Paul asks, and John replies: “Fine.” George stays silent, as he had since Paul yelled at him. If he’s actually concerned for George, he doesn’t show it. He just turns his focus back on the highway and drives.

A sign for a rest stop passes by them.

“We should stop,” John says, “to get something to eat.”

“Won’t the people there just try to kill us?” Paul rhetorically questions, not looking back at John.

“Ringo, will the people there try to kill us?”

“I dunno, we’ll have to get there to see,” Ringo replies.

“There, besides, yeh need to fill up on gas,” John says, gesturing at the dashboard.

“ _ Fine,  _ but only if Ringo can block them.”

“I’ll do me best,” he says, as he pulls up the book he’s been reading. He found it in the car they stole, and is only reading it out of boredom. John only looked at it for a few minutes before losing interest, and George was, and still is, completely unresponsive.

Paul sighs as he puts on his turn signal for the rightmost lane. It hasn’t been six hours, yet it feels like they’ve been in exile for days. He can’t help but feel that John and Ringo aren’t taking things nearly as seriously as they should, and George…

George won’t talk to him, so he’s not going to worry about him then.

They pull into a gas station and Ringo gives him a thumbs up. He exits the vehicle and sees that none of the other people there are batting an eye. Whatever made the people in the city snap out of the mind-control isn’t here, and Paul is more than grateful for it.

John lumbers out of the car, and stretches out dramatically. “Well, I’m gonna get some grub. Ringo, yeh coming?”

“Yeah, hold up, John!” he yells as he bumbles after John, leaving Paul alone.

He watches those two run off to the only store in sight, as the attendant fills up the car. With Ringo’s ability, they can actually live life normally. They’ll have to stick together for the rest of their lives, but other than that, life can be manageable.

It’s not until he sees John and Ringo sprinting at him a few minutes later that he realizes his plan might not work. He hears them screaming at him, and the gas jockey is shuddering.

The two draw closer, and Paul can understand what they’re saying.

"Fuck, Paul, start the car!"

* * *

12:01 PM - A few minutes prior

Ringo’s wandering the isles when a woman locks eyes with him. She blushes and smiles, and Ringo waves back to be polite. He thinks nothing more of the encounter and keeps browsing. John’s arms are loaded with food, most likely to fuel his newfound appetite, but Ringo is still looking, mind too preoccupied to focus on lunch.

He doesn't notice how the woman is following him. He's about to give up and go to John, who's at the cashier, when the woman screams.

He flips around and sees her holding a razor blade. 

"Your mind, give it to me!" she screeches as she swings it right at the third eye on his forehead. Ringo is able to duck just in time, but she swings again. He's not as fast, and some of his hair gets cut off.

She's about to cut at his head again when John rushes over to tackle her down.

"Ringo, run!" he yells, and Ringo does as he says. He darts out of the store, and John quickly pushes the woman down and follows him.

"Fuck, Paul, start the car!"

They watch as the gas attendant next to Paul charges at him, but Paul phases through the car door and starts the ignition. Slamming on the gas, he pulls up next to John and Ringo, and they jump in.

With that, they’re back on the road again like nothing had happened.

“What happened?” he asks, once the adrenaline wears off.

“Some lady tried to kill Ringo,” John says, voice calm.

“Yeah, she was going at me head with a razor!” Ringo says, still trying to catch his breath. “Only got some of me hair, though. Does it look bad?” he asks, fingers stroking the cut bit.

“Not really. You could say it’s a fab new style, and the people would buy it up,” John says.

“Would. As in past tense. They certainly won't now,” Paul points out, and they fall into silence. “We really can't be seen by anyone anymore.”

Ringo picks up his book again and John sighs. He was only able to snag a small snack from the store, and so busies himself eating it.

Ringo turns on the radio to combat the silence.

_ ...the hunt for The Beatles is still… _

It turns off immediately. 

* * *

6:24 PM

As time drags on, Paul feels his mind wandering. The endless track of road spans on in front of him.

He sees an image in his mind, but it’s all faded. It’s like trying to remember a dream; nothing in it makes sense.

He sees a hospital bed in his mind, and someone in it. It takes him too long to realize it’s George, with IVs and tubes sticking out of him.

And John’s there and he’s yelling, but none of his words are intelligible.

Suddenly, there’s a spike of pain in his chest, and it snaps him out of the illusion.

_ What was that…? _

He could only assume it was some kind of side-effect of his ghostly transformation, but there was a part of his mind that told him it wasn’t the case. But before he could question it anymore, George stirs.

He had forgotten he was even in the car.

“Christ mate, you look like shite,” John says, and George just sits up on the seat next to him. He curls the blanket around himself.

_ He looks more pale and skinny,  _ Paul thinks.

“Paul?”

“Yeah, George?”

“Is everything going to work out?” he whispers.

Paul hesitates. He doesn’t know what’s going to happen. “Of course it will,” he declares, and Ringo shudders as George’s thoughts wash over him. There’s a bitter sense of hatred.

_ Stop lying to me, Paul. I see right through you. _

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> The scene with the woman and the razor is inspired by the story of a woman who did cut off a piece of Ringo's hair. Obviously, she did not intend to kill Ringo.


	7. I Want to Tell You

???

Paul's head was spinning again. 

** _Hey, George, yeh hungry?_ **

** _No, not really._ **

** _Yeh sure? I haven't seen yeh eat breakfast._ **

** _Yeah, I'm just a little sick. Threw up a little._ **

He doesn't recognize the two voices, since they're distorted, but one of them is named George, so it's most likely Harrison.

A new voice joins in.

** _Yeh better not be getting sick. We have a big show tonight._ **

** _I'll be fine, don't worry._ **

** _If yeh say so. Let's get going now._ **

The vision blurs and Paul is brought back into the real world.

* * *

11:39 PM

They had to camp outside. They couldn't risk dealing with other people at a motel, and John's situation also ruled out being indoors. They had pulled off the road and into the woods, where they made a makeshift campsite. Luckily, Paul couldn't feel the cold nor need to sleep, same applied to George since he was undead as well. Ringo was the only one who needed to sleep, resting inside the car on an empty stomach, and John was currently running in circles. 

Fortunately, John stripped before he transformed, so his clothes lay in a pile in the car. Becoming a werewolf gave him excessive energy, and letting him run around was the easiest and safest way to disperse it. Paul watched him from the top of the car, with George next to him. 

The youngest moved closer to Paul.

"It's cold out tonight," he mutters.

"It's always cold for us," Paul replies, "but we'll figure out how to turn back into humans."

George just sighs in response. "I don’t think we’ll just magically fix  _ this _ that easily," he finishes.

"Not with that attitude," Paul says, but George just shakes his head more.

"Hey, what's wrong?" he asks.

"I don't think it'll get better," George whispers after a moment. "I just don't like feeling this way."

"The cold? It's not that bad once you get used to it."

"...yeah, the cold," is all George says, refusing to let out his true feelings. He creeps closer to Paul to rest his head on his shoulder, but he phases straight through and lands on the car.

"Sorry, I didn't mean to-" George stutters as he sits up.

"It's fine-" Paul quickly says, as he straightens himself. "You should, um, get some rest."

"I can't. Vampire, remember?" George replies.

Paul frowns. "You sure? 'Cos you look knackered, mate."

George only hums in response. He opens his mouth to ask a question when John appears in front of them.

He has a deer in between his jaws.

"Christ, John!" Paul cries. He jumps up in repulse and John drops the animal from his mouth.

John's sitting on the ground like an obedient dog, waiting for one of the two to react.

George lets out a small chuckle. "He's like a puppy, look at his tail." It was wagging ferociously. Paul just gapes in shock. John lets out a very deep bark, more like a roar, of annoyance.

"Good boy, Johnny, just get the deer out of here!" Paul screeches, and John obeys. It seems he can understand them now, which is very convenient compared to his violent outburst last night. There's a little blood where the deer's body was, but Paul can't see it in the darkness. George can, and he can also hear John violently ripping into the creature to eat. He involuntarily shivered.

"I'm gonna go and stretch me legs out," he says, rising.

He climbs up a tree and then darts across their canopies. Paul can only gaze in amazement at how deft George is; he's weaving through the branches extraordinarily gracefully.

George just needed some distance. John's gorging made his already aching stomach lurch, and if he were to be honest with himself, he felt sick.

Both in the physical sense and the mental: he was sick of the outside, the sun, his hunger and exhaustion, and how everyone was happier than him. He couldn't ask Paul for help, since he just didn't comprehend the scope of George's transformation. Paul had changed for the better, gaining fantastic new abilities, yet George’s life had become so much more worse because of what he had become. There was a fundamental disconnect between them, and it made him feel more alone than he ever had in his life.

John was slightly apathetic to him as well, but it wasn't as bad. Paul used to be his closest friend, but now they were drifting apart. The worst part is that George can't do a thing about it. Ringo understood him, partly because he can read minds, but George doesn't want him to see what he's thinking. He doesn't like not having control over his emotions. He's already the youngest in the group, so he can't act like a child that needs comforting everything something bad happens.

Paul's dealing with it, John's dealing with it, Ringo's dealing with it…

_ So I have to as well,  _ he thinks.

His foot misses a branch by a few inches, and he plummets to the ground. His knee is scraped, but he can feel it slowly mend itself. In his introspection, George hadn't realized that he was lost. He must have flown miles away. The moon was shining down on him.

_ AAahhhhhhhwwwwwooooooooooooo! _

Ah, that was John! Thank goodness too. He dashes to where he heard the sound, and can hear John move around.

_ He's really loud now,  _ he muses as an odor assaults him.

It's blood from the deer and it burns his sinuses with its intensity. The ache inside George flares, and he forces himself to stop.

He wants to drink it, so badly, but he won't let himself. He's so hungry, so thirsty, but he refuses to feed off of a living creature. Vampires are immortal; They won't die from starvation, so he's not going to steal the vitality of another creature to satisfy himself.

He uneasily goes to Paul and sits down on his hands, trying to fight the urge to go to the scent. It eventually weakens as the blood dries, and George slowly relaxes. He's calmer now, but he also feels more exhausted, so he lays down. Ringo's still snoozing in the car, and Paul is now reading the book that he had.

It was a psychology textbook, so chances are the car belongs to a college student taking a psychology course. 

"How was your walk?" Paul asks, looking up from his book to stare at George’s scraped knee.

_ Wasn’t his regeneration faster? _

"Fine." George curls up on himself. "Hey Paul?"

"What's up?"

"Can you… possess me?

Paul closes his book. "Uh, why would you want that?"

"Just curious," he lies. He knows John was rendered unconscious from Paul before, so if there was a chance it would work on him, he would take it. Just something to get him to sleep.

"...alright. Just stay still, okay?" Paul says and phases through George. He lines up their bodies and waits for the tugging sensation to kick in. 

It doesn't come, even after ten minutes. "Sorry, George," is all Paul can say.

"No, it's fine, it's just a stupid idea anyway."

"George… did you think it would make you sleep?"

He stiffened. "Yeah."

"Hey, Georgie, if something's wrong, you can tell me. We're friends, alright?"

"I just-" George sniffs, "-it hurts."

"What does?" Paul asks gently.

"Everything. It  _ hurts Paul! _ "

George grabs Paul and shoves his face in his shoulder. "I want to go back, before this happened."

Paul places his arms around George in what he hopes is a comforting hug. "I do too," he whispers. George sobs.

_ Is he crying? _

Paul's question is answered when a liquid drops from George's eyes. Instead of a water tear, like he expects, it's red. 

George is crying tears of blood.

They stay there, George crying into Paul. He has no idea on what to say to comfort him, so Paul just stays silent. He realizes he had never seen George openly weep before. George starts shaking and begins to mumble something.

“Paul- I- I- ne-”

He’s interrupted again by John approaching them.

Paul freezes, and the two pull away from each other. George quickly faces away from the two of them, wiping at his eyes. John’s whining for attention, so Paul jumps down from the car and goes to him.

George senses that Paul’s focus is no longer on him."I'm going to rest in the car," he says in a heavy voice, then disappears.

“‘Night, Geo,” Paul says, lamely. John nudges his muzzle under Paul’s arm, and before he knows it, he’s petting him.

Paul feels an odd ache in his chest about George right now, but John proves to be a great distraction.

The older lad then lays down and curls up at Paul’s feet.

_ He really is like a big puppy,  _ he muses. John’s breathing slows, and the two spend the night together. Just as John’s about to fall asleep, Paul’s vision swarms.

_ Not this again.... _

Everything gets blurry, and the edges of his sight are darkened. 

He sees himself in a mirror, and is surprised to see that he looks like a normal human: no glowing, blue skin, or transparency. 

In the corner of the mirror is George, laying on the bed. Paul wants to tell him that everything’s back to normal again, but he stops. Something is very wrong. George isn’t moving at all, and Paul breaks into a cold sweat.

He rushes over to George, and his breathing is incredibly slow. Panicked, Paul shakes him and calls his name.

“George! George! Wake up!” he screams, and his eyes slowly open. His eyes look dull and unfocused.

“...P...aul..?” he slurs. Then, he slowly reaches for something yellow on the bedside table, and before he can get it, the vision vanishes.

_ What the hell was that? _

Paul has no idea what the visions mean, but he knows they have to have a purpose. They have to be trying to tell him something. All he knows is that they have something to do with being a ghost. Beyond that, he has no clue what they are. 

_ Perhaps they’re visions of the future… or the past... _

He closes his eyes and tries futilely to fall asleep.

* * *

4:48 AM

Paul now knows more about neurotransmitters and hormones than he ever needed to know, but he had to pass the night somehow. He’s about to turn to the next chapter, when John starts to whimper.

He’s shaking and convulsing, as his added bulk starts to dissipate. He grunts as bones realign themselves, and organs shift. His fur, claws, and teeth retract, and all that’s left is a naked John, shivering in the cold.

“Fuck, if that happens every night...” he moans, voice shaky. His vocal chords just shrank. “...then I definitely have it the worst.”

Paul doesn’t think about George’s plight and agrees with John. “It is painful?”

“What do yeh think?” John snaps and rises to stand. “Ain’t never gonna get used to that.”

“Yeah,” Paul clears his throat. “Do yeh wanna get into the car and get going? After you get dressed, of course.”

John goes to the car and was surprised to see that Ringo was already up, eyes pulsating. Even stranger, was that George was curled up under the blanket on the floor again.

Opening the door, John asks: “What’s going on in here, then?”

Ringo’s eyes close. “George asked me to knock ‘im out, since he can’t sleep on his own.” He stifled a yawn. “‘M worried about ‘im, y’know?”

“I think he can figure it out on his own. Anyway, where’s me clothes?”

“Oh, yer clothes are in the front.”

“Ta,” John says, squeezing into them. Paul comes and gets in the driver’s seat, but his attention turns to George.

He’s lying very still, and Paul’s anxiety flares up. He thinks about the vision he had last night and sees the parallels to the current situation.

“George?” he asks, trying not to let fear overcome him.

“Oh, he’s fine, Ritchie just put ‘im to sleep.”

Paul lets out a breath he didn’t know he was holding. “Alright then, let’s get going.”

It takes a moment for the car engine to start, but it eventually gets going, and the four are back on the road again.


	8. Flying

7:32 AM

“Fuck!”

The car's engine broke down.

“Piece of shit!”

“Calm down, we can walk the rest of the way,” Paul says.

“No, we can’t!” John shouts. “George-”

“You can carry ‘im,” Paul interrupts.

“It doesn’t matter, there’s nowhere to go!” John yells, already beginning to transform. “You just want to keep running in circles around the problem! Are we gonna be doing this in twenty years? Thirty years?”

“We need to get away now so we can focus on how to turn back-”

“Stop pretending you have a plan when you don’t! How will yeh figure out how to fix this?”

“Both of you, just stop!” Ringo cries, and the two stare at him. “It’s only been two days and yer both trying to kill each other! What we need to do is get somewhere safe. For _ George. _ ”

That was enough to get them to quiet down.

“For George, yeah? Let’s go, then,” John says as he carefully picks up George bridal-style, not disturbing the blanket over him.

“Where are we going?” Paul asks, and John looks at him.

“Going hitchhiking,” Ringo says with a smile as his eyes begin to pulsate.

Exiting the car, Ringo looks out at the road.

“What’re yeh up to?” John asks him, and Ringo replies:

“Getting us a ride.”

A truck pulls over next to them. Inside is a bearded man.

“You fellas need a ride?”

Ringo closes his third eye. “Yeah, that’d be gear.”

The man lets them into the truck and drives on.

_ Ringo!  _ Paul mentally shouts.  _ What did you do? _

_ I just persuaded his head to let us in,  _ he replies, and Paul facepalms.

_ What if he snaps at us while driving? _

_ He won’t. It’s just one person; I can handle it. _

Paul takes Ringo’s reassurances and turns his attention to George. He’s still asleep, and Paul won’t risk distracting Ringo to wake him up.

“I think,” Paul begins, “That we should stop at a motel and get some proper rest.”

“And proper food. Ringo hasn’t eaten in a while,” John says, and then, in a quiet voice: “Neither has George.”

“I know,” Paul whispers, “but he’s a vampire. He needs blood.”

Paul licks his perpetually dry lips.

“...would you, um… offer?”

“What?”

“Yer blood, for George?”

“He can drink the blood of someone else, not his mate. Would you offer yer blood if yeh weren’t a ghost?” John asks, and Paul finds himself growing uncomfortable.

_ Would I?  _ He ponders. Paul wants to say he would, but a candid part of his mind tells him he wouldn’t. A pit forms in his midsection.

_ Would I rather let him starve than let him feed off of me? _

He can feel a dark nail being driven in his skull, and more oddly, in his right arm as well. The pain blossoms, crawling across his skin and bones.

_ What the hell is this?! _

His eyesight’s tapping out; another vision is coming.

_ Dammit, not again! _

“Paul!”

Suddenly, everything reverts back to normal; Paul’s in the back of the truck with John, desperately gasping for air.

“Christ, mate, what was that?”

“What- what did you see?” Paul asks, still struggling to breathe.

_ I don’t even have lungs, why can’t I breathe- _

“You were flickering out, like a lightbulb or something,” he says, fear creeping into his voice.

“Been having these-  _ flashes-  _ of us, but it never hurt like that-”

“Visions?”

“I was about to have one before you snapped me out of it,” Paul says, his non-existent heart rate calming. “We’re all regular humans, and there’s a hospital...”

John looks at him apprehensively. “Does... anything happen in ‘em?”

“I think that George is sick or something.” Then, to himself: “Maybe that’s why he’s in the hospital...”

“Well if that’s not ominous,” John says, gaze drifting to the figure huddled under the blankets.

They fall into silence, not wanting to distract Ringo anymore from the driver. 

After some time, Ringo speaks for the first time since entering the car.

“Get off here,” he commands, and they watch in amazement as the driver does as he’s told. None of them have ever feared Ringo before, but his powers were a spectacle to behold.

They’re about to get off, so John goes to George. “Ey, wake up,” he says, nudging the bundle.

It shifts, and then Paul and John lift the blanket to cover the three of them.

“Wha’s… going on…?” George questions; his mind feels like it was drenched underwater.

Paul’s stomach makes a knot. Despite his respite, he looks more exhausted, face pale and gaunt. “We’re getting off soon.”

His reaction is a delayed nod. “Okay,” he mumbles and then lurches forward. He starts gagging and coughing, and drool dribbles out of his mouth. Paul and John try to comfort George as he dry-heaves onto the floor of the truck. Only saliva comes out because he hasn’t eaten anything since changing.

Paul pats his back as the brakes of the truck engage. They’ve arrived at their destination.

“We’re gonna carry yeh in, okay?” Paul tells George, and he and John move to lift him.

They try not to think about how light he feels.

They’re able to get a room at the motel they were dropped off at, and they put George down on the couch. After drawing the blinds close at every window, they remove the blanket.

His breathing is shallow and his face is dazed.

Paul puts his hand on his shoulder. “Geo, you with us?”

“Yeah...” he moans. “I’m fine.”

“Yeh don’t look fine,” John calls from across the small room. “Yeh look like  _ shite. _ ”

“I just- need a shower,” he mumbles as he rises to go to the bathroom.

They listen to the shower being turned on. “What about you, Rings? Yeh holding up?”

“Yeah, I’m just really hungry. Not a lot to eat when yer on the run,” he says with a chuckle. “In all seriousness, I do need to have something, though.”

“Me too,” John comments as he pats his stomach. “Oh, Paulie?” he sings in a falsetto. “May Ringo and I go to the store for some morsels?”

“Yeah, just be careful, don’t get caught.”

“Yes, mother dear,” he mocks, as he and Ringo leave. The shower is still running, so Paul uses a pen and some napkins to formulate a plan.

They can’t go into a hospital to see a doctor because they’re wanted right now. They could get a house-call, and Ringo can hypnotize them, but Paul knew a doctor wouldn’t be able to help. Their affliction was supernatural in nature, not scientific. There were no books on how to not be a ghost, no precedent for their transformations.

John was right, he had no clue on how to even begin to solve their problems. What was there to do except run?

George then emerges from the shower, breaking Paul from his thoughts. There are red stains on the sleeves from his tears last night that Paul hadn’t noticed until now. He watches as George moves to the cheap couch and takes a seat.

Then the door bursts open, with John and Ringo standing there, arms laden with food.

“Honey, I’m home!” John yells.

“Where’d yeh get the money for all of that?” Paul asks, and George perks up.

“Oho,” John chuckles, “Let’s just say Ringo used his…  _ influence…  _ and persuaded them to give it to us.”

George turns to face the two. “Isn’t that stealing?”

“Not if they handed it to us.”

“Well John, technically speaking, if you point a gun at a banker, they’ll give you money too,” Ringo chimes, and John shakes his head.

“It’s not our fault we’re wanted criminals, so it’s not our fault we have ta  _ steal  _ either! Now shaddup and eat yer chips.”

Ringo didn’t need to be told twice. He sits down next to George, turns on the television, and digs into his lunch. 

John shoves some jerky into his mouth as he stares at Paul’s napkin. Then, in a whisper: “What the hell’re we gonna do?”

Paul hesitates. “I- I don’t know, but don’t tell George.” He looks over his shoulder at the man in question. “He’s not doing well.”

“I know that, but yeh can’t just pretend everything’s alright.”

“I-” Paul didn’t want to agree with John. “W-We’re strong, okay? If we stick together, we can work things out.”

John lets out a deep exhale and moves to the couch. There’s no room left for Paul, so he bends over his napkin. He pretends to be working, planning, but he can’t focus anymore. The room’s suddenly too small, the television too loud, and Paul feels the sensation of another vision take him.

_ Please, not this again… _

His right arm erupts into pain, and Paul can’t move anymore. It’s like his blood was replaced with lead.

Even his eyes struggle to look around. There’s darkness all around him, and it’s  _ frigid.  _ Wherever he is, it isn’t comforting. In the void, voices emerge.

** _TBI at the front of the head--_ **

** _The radius is fractured, and the ulna is dislocated at the wrist--_ **

** _Numerous skin lacerations--_ **

** _Paul…_ **

That was John’s voice, he’s sure of it--

** _What the hell were you thinking…? You fucking idiot..._ **

_ Why does he sound so sad…? What did he do…? _

“John?” he calls out, and the voices stop. The lead in his blood thickens into steel, and Paul drowns in the abyss.

When his eyes open again, it's evening. George is still watching television, but Ringo and John have moved to card games on the floor. 

The television roars with laughter. It's a variety show live in front of an audience. There's a woman and a dog on screen, but Paul's attention is on George. He's not smiling along with the program. Instead, it seems as though his eyes are staring  _ through  _ the screen, and not  _ at  _ it.

George then clutches his head with his hands and trembles. He falls forwards off the couch, and Paul thinks he's going to start gagging again.

He doesn't expect George to get up again.

He doesn't expect George to turn and stare with blood-red eyes.

He doesn't expect him to charge at John and rip his  _ neck open with his bare teeth. _

Blood flies everywhere, and for a moment, George is just a feral monstrosity trying to kill John. John roars in pain and hits George, forcing him across the room.

His face is covered in crimson, around his disgustingly long fangs, but also his eyes.

He's heaving, failing to trap any air in his lungs.

"...j-j...ohh..nn… ...oh god- god- I-I- "

" _ What the hell is wrong with you?! _ " Paul roars.

George freezes, and he grabs his head so hard his nails dig into his skull.

Paul watches as gigantic wings rip through George's back and reach the ceiling. They stretch and warp, and George has already thrown himself through the window.

Paul can only stare in horror as his silhouette dissipates into the night sky, abandoning them.


	9. Not Guilty

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> For those of you curious, Lusus Naturae is Latin for "whim of nature" and is used to refer to a freak, mutant, or monster.
> 
> We're nearing the end now.

???

Paul doesn’t know what time it is. He doesn’t seem to know anything anymore.

He thought was George was his friend, but that just proved to be a lie, didn't it?

John's already sprinting outside, hunting George down. He knows John wants to rip George's head off as revenge for the gnarled scar running from his jaw to his shoulder. Ringo's still at the motel, too traumatized to move.

Besides, it's pointless to chase someone who can fly.

Paul doesn't know why he's out running too. John's far faster, and George impossibly so. What will he do when he catches up? Ask George to come back politely?

George tried to kill John. There's no forgiveness. Chances are if they bring George back, he’ll just snap again.

That is if he hasn't already. John is long gone out of sight now. Maybe the best thing to do is to leave George alone. He certainly doesn't want to see anyone right now.

Honestly, neither does Paul. He just wants to disappear, vanish and never face the music.

Soon, his frantic searching turns into a stroll. What's the point in looking for George anymore? The woods are serene at night, and it's the perfect backdrop Paul needs to reflect. 

He wonders if The Beatles would work as a trio.

It's the last thing he should be thinking about, but it keeps his mind off of recent events.

John's howling rings in the distance. Paul freezes. He prays that John didn't find George; he doesn't want to see the lad.

Maybe if he didn't yell at George, they could have talked it out.

But if George just drank some blood, then he wouldn't have snapped. 

Maybe if he told George that he needed to drink, he would have listened and tried.

Why is he even thinking about this? George was the one who pushed his starvation inside and buried it. It was his fault that he lost control of himself.

But if it was, why did Paul feel malaise in his gut?

_Not guilty,_ he repeats to himself. _Not guilty, not guilty, not guilty._

He just needs to keep walking, clear his head. The moon really was beautiful at night. Amid his introspection, Paul fails to notice the edges of his periphery falling into darkness. It’s the onset of another vision, closer to a nightmare now.

He expecting something terrible, another hospital, more pain, more unanswered questions, but instead, he sees George.

Human George, untouched by blood and carnage. No wings or fangs or terrible gleaming eyes.

"What do you want?" He spits out at the illusion. "Just here to fuck with me?"

The phantasm flickers and then walks forward into the woods. Paul doesn't move to follow. He won't bend to the flashes of visions that plague him. He instead turns to walk the opposite direction. 

He's not going to follow George, even if he is an illusion. The facts are that George tried to maim John because drinking blood goes against his morals. That's it. He doesn't deserve a life-line.

_ He doesn't deserve to suffer as a vampire either. _

_Shut up!_ he growls at his subconscious. Paul marches onwards until he feels a tug.

It's the illusory George, and he's pulling at Paul's arm.

"What the hell do you want?" he snaps. The other George points into the woods, opposite of where Paul's going.

"No. Piss off," he growls and continues walking.

"Why don't you care?" George asks, and Paul freezes.

Hallucinations aren't supposed to touch you or talk to you. Paul whips around and stares at the other George. And then he laughs.

"You're not George, you're just my subconscious, trying to make me feel bad for leaving you." Then he stares the fake George dead in the eyes. "You hurt John. You don't deserve my pity, so _fuck off._"

The fake George doesn't respond. He merely gazes at Paul, then walks deeper into the woods.

Paul huffs. Fine, he doesn't want anything to do with freaky hallucinations. As he walks, however, he finds himself thinking. He's been having these visions for a while, and this is the first time that it physically interacted with him. Before, it was like watching a perverse movie you couldn't control.

_Fuck,_ he mutters under his breath. If he wants any answers, he’s going to have to follow the fake George, isn't he?

“Alright, you win. What’s so darned important?”

The fake George doesn’t smile, per se, but something in its expression lightens. The two set off in an unknown direction in silence.

Paul is the first to break it. “What are you trying to show me?”

The fake George doesn’t immediately reply. It (Paul won’t refer to the hallucination as a _he_) then slows. “Do you remember the first time we met?” it asks.

“Yeah, sat next to me on the bus.” Then, in a cynical voice, “Why’re yeh asking?

“Would we have been friends if the seat was taken that day?”

Paul hesitates. George was a year below him in school, and they met under a coincidence. If that seat was taken, then there would be no reason for Paul to know George.

“Of course,” Paul lies, and the hallucination shifts. Fake George’s expression gets colder.

“We wouldn’t have,” is all that it says before continuing forwards. “Are we even friends now?” it asks.

“Not after you attacked John,” Paul replies candidly. “But before this transformation business, I’d say yeah. We used to be the closest.”

“Used to, but not anymore,” it whispers.

“What do you mean? We’re still friends, aren’t we?”

The fake George doesn’t reply, instead marching ever onwards. Paul wonders why he even tried to hold a conversation with a figment of his own mind.

The fake George is just a figment, right?

They keep wandering. The fake George seems to know where he’s going, but it feels like an aimless direction to Paul. It breaks the silence again with another question. 

“Do you care about me?”

It asked the same question before, yet Paul’s caught off-guard.

“I...” He decides to be honest. “I’d like to say that I do, but you’re not making it easy on me.”

“You haven’t made it easy, either,” it says, not looking at Paul.

“Sorry,” is all Paul can say in response. Then, he clears his throat.

“Why did you hurt John? Why didn’t you try to get blood?”

“I didn’t want to be a burden. It would be unfair for me to steal the life of another creature to prolong my own.”

“Even if John or Ringo offered their blood for you?”

“Especially not then. They don’t have to hurt me to live, so I shouldn’t have to hurt them.”

“You could’ve asked for help.”

“Would any of you give aid to me?”

Fake George was good at cutting right at your heart. Paul had asked John about giving his blood to George, and he refused. It makes sense he wouldn't want to ask for help. He was already aware they wouldn't when push came to shove.

"...alright. Let's just keep going."

The moonlight shines through the canopy of leaves, illuminating the forest with a blue glow. _It's rather beautiful,_ he thinks. They pass a gently running brook. The foliage is getting thicker as well. Paul can see why George gets enamored with nature. There's tranquil beauty in its serenity.

He loses track of time. They must have been wandering for an hour. It's just too easy to get lost in the moss-covered trees reaching to the sky and gentle hum of insects. He feels like a child again, exploring the unknown and going on adventures. 

"Thanks," he says suddenly, "for this. It's nice." Paul only needed to clear his head. The other George wasn't leading him anywhere specific; he was just trying to calm Paul.

When Paul looks at the other George, he can see the monstrosity that attacked John, but he also sees the boy that sat next to him on the bus. He sees his best friend.

_We really were the closest._

Paul fills with a sense of admiration and nostalgia. 

"I'm sorry for yelling at you," he says, trying to keep his voice as even as possible. "It's not your fault. You didn’t decide to be a vampire, and you didn’t want to hurt anyone."

The other George looks back at him and smiles. Not just a twitch at the corner of his lips, but a genuine smile.

_ How long has it been since I’ve seen him smile like that? _

“Thank you,” he says. There’s this light in his eyes, a vitality that was previously hidden. “Now all you have to do is tell _him_ that.”

“Him- Do you mean the real George?”

“The other George, yes.”

“Can I ask you something?”

He looks at Paul expectantly.

“Just… who are you? Are you my conscience?”

“Can’t you recognize me? I’m George Harrison,” he chuckles.

“Well yes, but the real George is a vampire and flew away. You’re not that George. You have to be one of my visions, right?”

“You have it backward,” he cryptically replies. Before Paul can ask what he means, he points at a clearing in front of them.

“Go to him,” is all he says before vanishing.

As Paul looks onwards, he sees that there is a destroyed tree, broken at the base of its trunk. When he observes it more, he sees blood. A clue to George’s location. In his peripheral, he sees claw marks in the bark of nearby trees.

So this is where George went…

He must not have been in control, because the slashings are sporadic. It looks like a beast had barrelled through, out of control. The once gorgeous woods become sinister as he gets closer to his destination.

“George?” he tentatively calls. There’s no response.

Paul tries not to think about what he will have to do in the case that George is still feral. All he can do is hope it will be fine.

His hunting leads him to a small cave. Water is running into it, but no light enters. Paul musters his courage and goes inside. He finds that his faintly glowing skin illuminates the cavern. He sees the strange cave-dwelling creatures scurry away from him as he goes deeper. The water grows less shallow and murkier as he proceeds.

Squeezing past stalagmites, he hits a dead-end. George must have gone this way, but there’s nowhere left to search.

Nowhere left, but down.

There’s a dark spot in the depths of the water, and Paul realizes the tunnel continues underwater. He breaches the surface and swims slowly. He doesn’t need to breathe, so he can take his time. Anxiety won’t allow him to proceed faster. The underwater tunnel gets darker as there’s more pollution. Dirt and muck have flooded into the cave and turned once clear water into murky sludge. It gets so thick that Paul almost doesn’t notice the crimson tones intermingled in the liquid.

Blood.

The tunnel turns upward, and Paul can see the surface of the water. When he exits, he sees a trail of blood leading from the pool deeper into the cave. There’s this terrible stench lingering in the air, the kind that tells Paul not to continue. As much as he wants to run away, however, he keeps following the trail.

His head is starting to hurt again, as does his arm, but he ignores it.

The edges of his vision blur and warp, but Paul only focuses on the sight ahead of him.

And then he stops as if time had broken and forced him to stand still. He wants to vomit, to scream, to cry, but he can’t move at all.

The _thing_ in front of him wasn’t George.

The membrane of its wings was torn like a ragged fabric. Its mouth hung open, with horrible liquid oozing out. Its bones jutted out from its ashen grey flesh as blood leaked from the cavity in its chest. It had hollowed itself out with its own gnarled claws. 

It was a _corpse._

Everything spun as static roars in Paul’s ears. He has to get out, he has to go, he has to go!

He doesn’t know how he gets out, but one second he was frozen, staring at George’s-

-Not George’s, that thing was not George-

-at a corpse, and now he’s almost out of the terrible cavern.

He wants to forget everything, he never wants to see that sight again, but it’s already seared into his eyes, replaying over and over and over-

He’s already at the mouth of the cave, where the water runs clear.

When Paul finally gets out, everything stops. His panic subsides, the static, the pain, all of it suddenly stops.

All he sees is a bright flash.

And then all turns to darkness.


	10. Golden Slumbers

???

…

…

…Wake up…

Paul’s eyes remain shut. He doesn’t want to open them. The last time they were open, he saw George’s dead body. Fear won’t allow him to make that mistake again. The sound of an ocean fills his ears.

“Paul, you have to get up. You can’t ignore this.”

That’s Georges’s voice...

...but he’s dead.

“You can’t keep your eyes closed forever.”

Despite his intentions, Paul’s eyes open. He has to know, is it really George, and is he really alive?

It’s the other George, the fake George. He looks terribly thin and pale. All around them is a dark sea filled with black water. The shadowed waves of the sea ebb and flow.

“You alright? Took a nasty fall earlier.”

“I don’t remember,” Paul replies. “You were dead.”

“No, Paul. But I am dying. That’s why I have to talk to you.”

“Why? What is it that you want me to do?”

He stays silent, staring at Paul with deadened eyes. Paul lets out a laugh. Like he was ever going to get a straight answer.

“You’re George.” It’s a statement, not a question.

“Yes.”

“You died, and I’m speaking to what’s left.”

Silence.

“You’ll have to figure it out on your own,” George answers. It’s hard to hear him over the sound of waves crashing from the dark see.

“Why can’t you just tell me outright what I need to do?” Paul’s tired of the game he’s playing.

“I have.”

“No, you haven’t. You still haven’t told me what the visions are or who you are either.”

“But I have.”

He opens his mouth to speak, and a chorus comes out:

Paul,

You

Need

To

** _WAKE UP!_ **

* * *

3:57 PM, November 8th, 1964

He first hears murmurs, the hum of machinery and people talking. There’s the monotonous beeping of the heart rate monitor slowly accelerating.

“Shh- He’s waking up!”

Paul opens his eyes. The white fluorescent lights burn his retinas. John, Ringo, Brian, and a medical professional are all in the room with him.

But there's something wrong.

John stands in the back of the room, silent. Brian's face is as cold as ice, and Ringo isn't radiating warmth as he usually does. 

Before Paul can question what's going on, he looks down at himself.

_ This is another vision… _

His head and right arm hurt because they’re both wrapped in bandages. His arm is in a large cast, elevated. 

_ So that's why it keeps hurting, it’s broken. _

Like before, he's no longer a ghost. His pink, fleshy skin is staring back at him.

"Paul?" Ringo asks with an expectant look. He's missing the third eye Paul has grown accustomed to.

"You're human again," he says with a rough voice. He's surprised at how gravelly it is.

John crosses his arms.

Ringo has a gentle, yet impersonal smile. "Always have been. How're yeh feeling?"

Paul can only concentrate on the ache of his arm. "Arm hurts."

"Paul… do you remember how you got injured?" Brian asks.

Paul decides to play along with the vision. He's tired of fighting it. "I was in a cave, and then I saw-"

He suddenly stops and looks around. "Where's George?

Everyone shifts uncomfortably. The doctor then clears his throat. "What happened in the cave?"

Paul doesn't like the voiceless emotions flowing in the room. Everyone knows something he doesn't, but he keeps talking regardless.

"I was looking for George," he continues. "And I went in the cave, and he was-" Paul can't stop his voice from cracking. "- and there was a dead body."

John's folded arms tense up.

"What did you do when you saw him?"

"I- I ran out, and then I saw a light. And now I'm-"

"You fucker!" John shouts, and then grabs Paul by the thin hospital gown he's wearing. "I'll kill you, I'll fucking-"

"John stop!" Brian shouts.

"Stop playing games with me!" John snarls in Paul’s face.

The other three in the room pull John back, and Brian ushers him out. Paul attempts to ignore their violent arguing.

“So,” he starts, “What's this vision trying to tell me?”

Ringo looks at him quizzically. “What?”

Paul sighs. “The real Ringo is in the motel right now, isn't he?”

“What motel, Paul?”

“The one we were in when George attacked John.”

Ringo’s two eyes widen. “Paul… what day do you think it is?”

"I don't know, Thursday?"

The doctor sits up straight. "What do you think the date is today?"

Odd question, but Paul answers it as honestly as possible. "Should be late August," then adds, "1964."

"It's November 8th, Paul," Ringo says, voice filled with concern. 

"It's only natural. He has a concussion at the front of his skull, so delirium is to be expected."

Their voices drop in volume. "So he doesn't remember a thing?" Ringo asks the doctor.

"I believe he remembers what happened, just differently. He recalls a motel, George's body, and a bright light."

"It's funny," Paul speaks, interrupting their discussion. "It's almost like this vision is trying to convince me it's reality."

After a moment, Ringo stands. "This is reality, Paul. George's still in the hospital."

Paul doesn’t hear Ringo, or at the very least, refuses to listen to him. He can already feel his body slowly shutting down, pulling away from the bizarre dream he’s trapped in. Before he can do so, John and Brian enter again.

Their faces are set in stone, but John’s has anger boiling under the surface.

“Mr. McCartney, how about you tell us what happened to you, and we can clarify the facts.” John opens his mouth to object, but the doctor silences him. “No interruptions, please.”

Paul inhales, taking in as much air as possible before letting it all out slowly. 

“Okay,” he says and begins to recount his story.

“It started when we were in New York. Me, George, and Ringo, we were all sick one morning.”

The doctor’s voice cuts in and asks him a question. “What were their symptoms?”

“Ringo had a headache and fever, me and George were really cold, and he threw up.”

The doctor nods.

“So, I went to Brian, told him that George and Ringo weren’t feeling good, and when I got back, I was- um...”

The others look at him expectantly.

“I was a ghost.”

They stare like they’re expecting the punchline for a joke.

“I could see through my hands and phase through walls, and I wasn’t the only one. Ringo had these mind powers, John was a werewolf, and George was a vampire.”

“This is a waste of time,” John spits out. “He’s fucking insane.”

“Then what did happen? No one’s telling me anything!” Paul yells back.

“...George is sick,” Ringo mutters. “And was hurting.”

A conversation flashes before Paul’s eyes. It’s between him and George, but they’re both humans.

_ I just-it hurts. _

_ What does? _

_ Everything. It hurts Paul! _

Brian takes the responsibility of telling the story. “He wasn’t happy anymore,” he states. “He stopped eating and going out.”

_ ...George had stopped eating, and refused to drink blood… _

_ ...and he couldn’t go out anymore because of the sun even though he loved being outside… _

“He was just really quiet all the time, and we thought it was because he was, y’know, stressed out,” Ringo continues. “He had trouble sleeping.”

“I remember you helped him with that,” Paul whispers, and the doctor goes to his notes again.

“Yeah... I gave him some of my sleeping pills,” Ringo says while folding his hands over themselves.

_ ...Ringo had to put him to sleep, but he was still so exhausted after waking up… _

_ ...and the vision in the hotel where he reached for a yellow bottle on the bedside table and was slow to wake... _

Paul’s head is swimming now, but the others keep talking.

“He snapped at me one day, and you yelled at him, remember?” John asks, and Paul wished he hadn’t. The story the four of them are weaving makes more sense than them turning into monsters, but Paul doesn’t like it. He wants to go back to his reality, the one where George wasn’t in a hospital or was a rotting corpse at the bottom of a cave. A reality where he can pretend that everything is perfect.

_ ...his voice echoes in his head… _

_ What the hell is wrong with you?! _

_ ...and George just shook as tears flew from his face before running away... _

“What-” he chokes out, “-what did he do next?”

“He ran off, and I found him,” John speaks, still tense.

_ ...John chasing him down violently in the woods… _

_ ...while Paul strolled off with the illusion of George... _

“We took him to the hospital,” he says.

_ Paul can see what happens next in his memories. _

_ He can see the bed George is in. _

_ He can hear the others blaming themselves for not doing something, for not being able to help him. _

_ He can see George’s pale and skeletal body laying in bed, with IVs and tubes coming out of him. _

_ He can feel the world melting around him as sees the depths of George’s pain for the first time. _

_ He runs out of the hospital room with his blood rushing to his head. _

_ It’s too loud, too painful, too terrifying. _

_ He has to get out, he has to get away. _

_ He doesn’t look where he’s going and runs out into the middle of the street. _

_ The world’s spinning as the headlights of a car blind him. _

_ He hears the sound of bone being crushed by metal. _

_ And all he knows is darkness. _


	11. All Things Must Pass

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This is the end now
> 
> Thank you all for reading, it means a lot to me

7:44 PM, November 8th, 1964

Paul didn’t realize he blacked out again. The only person who remained with him is John, still bitter.

“You idiot,” John says from his seat.

Paul didn’t expect that to be his greeting. He didn’t expect to be in a hospital or for George-

Don’t think about that, he tells himself.

“John?” he asks, unable to come up with anything else to say.

“I thought George was dead when I found him,” he says in a vulnerable voice. John looks up at Paul, and his eyes are red. “He wasn’t moving.”

Paul can’t bring himself to look in John’s eyes anymore. He can only stare away, gaze settling on his cast.

“When he was in the hospital, you brushed it all off. You kept on saying that he’ll be fine, but he isn’t.”

Paul stays still. John’s voice gets more and more despondent. “He was dying Paul. And we didn’t do a thing about it. And then-”

“-and then you ran out like that!” he shouts. “I should kill you for that, you fucking bastard!” He stands up and looks down at Paul, then pulls his arm back. He has his fist raised, prime to hit Paul.

Instead, tears drop onto his cast. “I thought I was going to lose both of you.”

Paul looks up to see John at his most vulnerable. The tears are trailing from his eyes and they aren’t stopping. John’s fist instead falls weakly to his side.

“I love you both too much,” he mutters, before leaving the room, face stained.

* * *

9:03 AM, November 9th, 1964

Although the pain in his arm and head aren’t as bad as they once were, Paul wished they hurt more. God, he wishes that the car put him into a coma. He desperately wants to do everything in his power to avoid having to face reality.

Said reality was fast approaching, as the nurse was out getting a wheelchair for him. When she comes back, she’ll take Paul to see him-

She’ll take Paul to see George.

Saying it like that in his head doesn’t make it any easier to swallow. He knows he’s not ready to see George, yet he knows that he never will. Paul has to face the nightmare his world has come to, whether he’s prepared or not.

The nurse is back and is already helping him into the chair. He might be on the same floor as George, but the distance between them is immense. It feels like hours before they finally reach the door. The nurse opens it, and they enter.

It’s dark. The lights are off, and the only light entering is from the overcast sky through the window. There are IVs and machines in sight, but they are all silent. In the center of the room is a bed with immaculate white sheets. Next to it is a bedside stand with a bouquet, slightly wilted. He sees some cards next to the orange flowers with handwritten messages. And on top of the bed-

Paul feels his throat constrict. The nurse wheels him closer to the bed, before leaving to give them an hour of privacy.

He forces himself to look up, at what’s on top of the bed. It’s pale and thin and still.

It’s George.

After admitting it to himself, he breaks down crying. He can’t stop it no matter how hard he tries.

John was right, he is an idiot. George is unconscious in bed, so, so lonely, and everyone thinks that both of them were going to die. Yet Paul is the one crying, feeling miserable. He shouldn’t want to be pitied, he brought this upon himself.

He leans forward and grasps George’s hand with his left. Paul can see and feel the bones in his hands. The strong fingers that once played guitar were no more than skeletal digits.

Paul tries not to look at George’s face. His cheeks and eyes have sunken in so much that it looks like a skull.

“I’m sorry,” is all he can say.

He grips his hand harder and then begins to ramble about anything and everything. The silence in the room is just too much and he has to fill it. He tells funny stories from when he was a kid and his favorite moments spent with George. Paul’s words are meaningless, but he prays that his anecdotes might be able to cheer George up.

But George remains asleep.

He stops talking. His foolish hope that George would awake with a smile and laughter was just that, foolish. They stay there, Paul gently stroking George’s hand. He tries to only focus on George in front of him, but all his memories and feelings flood his heart. He’s so swept up in emotion that he doesn’t notice the nurse had returned. She tells him something, but Paul can’t hear it. She pulls the chair back and takes Paul away to his room. His blood feels like it froze in his veins.

* * *

8:42 PM, November 10th, 1964

George is recovered enough to take him home. Once he was awake, preparations were made and he was gone. Paul didn’t get to say anything to him since he was asleep.

All Paul can do is think about him and hope he’s doing alright. Once he is out of the hospital, he’s going to call George and visit him. He wants to be there for George; he wants to a good friend.

Ringo still visits Paul frequently and tells him about George. From what he's heard, George’s going to spend some time with his family, and then he’ll move into a flat with Ringo.

“What about the band?” Paul asks, trying to fill the void.

Ringo shifts in his seat. “I don’t think George will tour anymore. He might come back to the studio, but I doubt it. He doesn’t have any interest in music now.”

Paul sighs and Ringo gives him an odd look. “I’m not upset about the band, I’m just upset that he won’t play anymore. He loved to, y’know?”

“Yeah, he did,” Ringo agrees and the two of them move on to talk about other topics.

Time passes until Ringo glances at the clock and realizes it’s almost ten. “I have to get going now, I’m afraid.”

“Oh, no, it’s fine. I appreciate you spending time with me,” Paul says, thinking of how he hasn’t seen John since the 8th.

“You’ll give me a call once you’re out, right?”

“Of course,” Paul says with a sad smile.

* * *

5:05 PM, December 24th, 1964

He should be happy and smiling, but Paul can't stop the growing pit of anxiety in his stomach. George had been invited to John’s for Christmas Eve and was surprised to hear that the younger man had said yes. He was never able to visit George; the younger man always denied him. Paul knew it wasn’t out of malice; he just needed space and Paul never pushed it. Although they had spoken on the phone, there was never a personal meeting.

Until today.

So there he was, waiting by the door, nervously picking at his cast while John and the other guests chat and mingle. Ringo told him that George would arrive at five. Five minutes have passed since then.

Was George going to show? Or did he just agree to be nice to Paul?

His nervous monologue is interrupted by a light knocking at the door. He hastily opens it to see George. He’s wearing a long sweater that’s big on him. It fit him five months ago, but Paul doesn’t comment on it. He just smiles and says “It’s lovely to see you.”

“Yeah,” is all George says in reply. They awkwardly stand there for a moment. 

“Do you want to come in?” Paul asks after George doesn’t move.

George silently nods and enters. Once he’s in the main living space, the party freezes and stares. It’s the first time many of them have seen George after the cancellation of the 1964 tour. George is far from where he was, subdued in all his mannerisms. The crowd doesn’t know what to say, so Paul leads George over to a more quiet spot.

“Can I get you anything to drink?”

George looks at him for a moment before answering with a “Water, please.” Paul leaves to fulfill his request, and when he gets back, Ringo is already talking to George. There’s a flutter in Paul’s chest when he sees the corners of George’s mouth curled up. It’s the ghost of a smile.

God, it’s been far too long since he’s seen that. He hands George his glass just as John puts on a much more upbeat record. He cranks the volume up, and everyone is filled with energy. Some people start dancing, and the conversations get more lively.

George doesn’t move, but he doesn’t seem as skittish as before. Paul picks at the bulky cast on his arm again.

“So, um, how have you been lately?” he asks.

George’s gaze lands on Paul. “I don’t know,” is all he says.

“Well, that’s better than feeling miserable,” Paul replies.

“Well, wait! Guess what he just told me!” Ringo adds with a big grin. Paul looks at George who looks down sheepishly. Before Paul can guess, Ringo tells him the answer. “George said that we might be able to play again. Not on tour, but in the studio, making albums.”

“Really?” he asks as George locks eyes with him.

“Maybe later, not right now.” He scratches at the back of his neck.

Paul chuckles. “Of course not, we’re celebrating Christmas right now!”

“And I can’t wait, either. Have you seen the roast Cynthia’s cooking?”

Paul realizes he’s hasn’t entered the kitchen yet. “No,” he answers, and Ringo quickly speaks up.

“Course not! You were at the door the whole time.”

George quietly asks why.

“‘Cos he was waiting for you to show up.” Ringo answers before Paul can even speak. A slight pink dusts George’s gaunt cheeks.

“Well then, I’m gonna go see if she needs any help then,” Paul says as he excuses himself. Ringo waves goodbye and George does too, albeit much more reserved.

Paul hums a little as he leaves. He feels light all of a sudden, as if a weight had been removed from his shoulders.

* * *

???

Paul doesn’t know what time it is. It’s late and it’s Christmas Eve, but the rich, heavy meal sitting in his stomach stops him from thinking anymore. He wants to pass out on the couch under the heavy blanket sitting on him and George. He ate some of the roast as well, and Ringo gushed to Paul after dinner George ate more than usual.

They were both sinking into the plush sofa, close to each other. George leans over and rests his head on Paul’s shoulder. Paul reaches his arm around George and holds him tight when George doesn’t pull away.

“Hey, George?”

“Yeah?”

“I’m glad you came.”

George relaxes more into Paul’s touch. Paul won’t lie to himself, George is not okay. But he is getting better, and it warms his heart to know that. 

He’s happy and cozy, but most importantly, sleepy. His eyelids fall as unconsciousness washes over him, like the waves on a warm beach. He almost misses George’s last words to him.

“Me too.”


End file.
